Visiting Mrs Nabokov

To this tantalizing nonfiction collection Martin Amis brings the same megawatt wit, wickedly acute perception, and ebullient wordplay that characterize his novels. He encompasses the full range of contemporary politics and culture (high and low) while also traveling to China for soccer with Elton John and to London's darts-crazy pubs in search of the perfect throw. These essays by Martin Amis provide portraits of contemporaries and mentors: Larkin and Rushdie, Burgess, Ballard, Nicholson Baker and John Updike. From across the Atlantic, he exposes the double-think of nuke-speak in Washington and the dementia of a Republican convention in New Orleans. And then there is sport. Checking out darts' disastrous attempt to clean itself up, Amis sneaks tips from the world number one, and witnesses the sad and sudden decline of Keith Deller. An account of dirty tricks in world chess reveals, "It's not an art. It's a fight." And so it is when he takes on the snooker savvy of Julian "Barometer" Barnes, or indulges in some brisk, but vicious poker with Al Alvarez and David Mamet. "Sex" without Madonna, expulsion from school, the Notting Hill Carnival, a Stones gig that should have been gagged - it's all here, as well as on set with Robocop or set-down with Sabatini.