GOLDEN AFTERNOON

Kate Reading sympathetically reads Molly Kaye's autobiographical reminiscences of bygone India. Her indolent salad days there are laced with humor, self-deprecation, occasional excitement, and seemingly endless partying in the Kashmir, Delhi, and elsewhere. Events include the demolition of the seat of her overly buttoned dress by a caned chair bottom, the unraveling of her evening gown on the way to the chemist, the antics of a drunken Mephistopheles in FAUST, the bloody doings of man-eating crocodiles on the Ganges River, and a tiger beat in the bush. The narration is calm, cultured, and unhurried, and thus enhances the mood of the book and reflects the highly civilized and privileged ways of the British ruling classes in early twentieth-century India. J.D.N. © AudioFile 2001, Portland, Maine [Published: APR/MAY 01]