Dashing for the Post: The Letters of Patrick Leigh Fermor

Wow - one tour de force after another! The best letters are as good as - if not better than - any in the language: Byron's, Walpole's, Henry James's, Freya Stark's. Often I laughed aloud, tears coursing down the cheeks
Zestful, vivid and buoyant with polymathic learning, Leigh Fermor's letters reveal themselves perfect for anthology. There are descriptions and anecdotes equal to anything in his writing, spurred by memorable friendships, suffused with affection and occasional distress: all finely edited by Adam Sisman
Hugely entertaining, funny and occasionally moving . . . edited meticulously and brilliantly
Zest, verbal finesse, almost pristine receptivity and a richly informed cultural and historical consciousness make these letters, even when the erosions of time and illness shadow them, irresistibly exhilarating
Adam Sisman is a model editor . . . Reading these letters is like gobbling down a tray of exotically filled chocolates, with no horrible orange creams to put you off
Here is a veritable feast for fans of Paddy Leigh Fermor . . . Sisman has done a tremendous job selecting and editing this treasure-trove of letters
Glorious, heady stuff . . . judiciously edited by Adam Sisman
Adam Sisman's selection of Patrick Leigh Fermor's letters is entirely admirable . . . an unmissable feast
Superbly edited . . . To read these letters and their superb footnotes is to walk with some of the great ghosts of 20th century literature
A feast of adventure, gossip and flirtation
It remains an outright pleasure to be admitted to the company of such a man. This is one of those books that make you feel a little bereft when you finish it
A fascinating and engaging sort of autobiography full of the charm found in his travel writings. Wonderful to dip into