Subject: FLYING DUTCH by Tom Holt

From: [email-masked]
Date: 12 Aug 93 23:20:00 GMT

FLYING DUTCH by Tom	Holt
		       A book review by	Evelyn C. Leeper
			Copyright 1993 Evelyn C. Leeper

     First it was the Ring of the Niebelung in EXPECTING SOMEONE TALLER.
Then it was BEOWULF in WHO'S AFRAID OF BEOWULF?  And now Tom Holt is busy
looking at what the Flying Dutchman would REALLY be like.

     Holt's humor relies largely on the matter-of-fact tone he adopts,
whether he's talking about bores ("Such was Paul's skill at grabbing the
attention of the viewer that if he told you your ears were on fire you'd be
so bored with the topic you wouldn't bother putting them out") or world
order ("So if we have third world poverty and nuclear weapons and East-West
hostility and economic depressions, but all brought about by means of the
democratic process, then that's all right, but if just one man is
responsible, then it's tyranny.  Sorry, I never did history at school, I
don't understand these things").

     I have only one minor quibble--the arithmetic on page 177 was done on a
calculator that introduced a round-off error.  But counter-balancing this is
the fact that Holt mentions my old home town of Chicopee Falls,
Massachusetts (though there is, of course, no University of Chicopee Falls).
I enjoyed FLYING DUTCH better than WHO'S AFRAID OF BEOWULF? and as much as
EXPECTING SOMEONE TALLER--which I loved.  To anyone looking for a very funny
book, I highly recommend FLYING DUTCH.

%T	  Flying Dutch
%A	  Tom Holt
%C	  New York
%D	  June 1993
%I	  Ace
%O	  paperback, US$4.50 [1992]
%G	  ISBN 0-441-24193-X
%P	  252pp

-- 
Evelyn C. Leeper | +1 908 957 2070 | [email-masked] / [email-masked]