Jim Crace — Six

Viking 2003 Hardback, 232pp. In the theatres and the restaurants of the celebrated City of Kisses, timid actor Felix Dern is famous and admired. for his looks. for his voice. and for his unblemished private life. But 'Lix' feels besieged. His perfect life has been blighted since his teens. for every woman that he sleeps with bears his child. So, now it is Mouetta's turn. Their baby's due in May. Another child? To be so fertile is a curse. Raunchy, revelatory and beautifully refined, Six charts the sexual history of a loving, baffled man, the sexual emancipation of a city, and the sexual ambiguities of humankind. DJ. Fading on dust jacket. (ISBN: 9780670881161). Good.