This, together with the letters of Nancy Mitford and Evelyn Waugh to each other, is the best antidote to boredom or depression. Indeed, it is second only to Scoop for sheer, elegant, malicious, sustained wit, and fascinating characters based on Nancy Mitford's own extraordinary family, including her sisters Jessica (became a Communist and wrote The American Way of Death), Diana (married first Brian Guinness, of the beer fortune, then Sir Oswald Moseley, the Leader of the British Union of Fascists, and was locked up in prison during the war with him, even though she was a cousin of Churchill's, for being a Fascist and a Nazi sympathizer), and Unity (who moved to Germany and fell in love with Hitler), and such unforgettable characters as "The Bolter" who moves from husband to husband so quickly no body can keep track. As for the Waugh/Mitford letters, sheer delight, reading them is like eating Fran's (of Seattle) salt and caramel chocolates (President Obama's favorite nosh) while drinking champagne.