The Pregnant Widow - Tapa blanda

"There is a sort of reverse bathos operating in Amis in which he slips from the empty epic to the comic sublime. At such moments, and there are plenty... no one better understands the cosmic joke that is humanity. Nor is anyone as funny telling it" (Observer)

"Amis employs his trademark derisive wit" (Marie Claire)

"Sumptuous... Moving and humane, The Pregnant Widow also captivates by the accumstomed wit and elegance of its style. Amis just writes so well and so freshly... Amis is consistently bold, visual and accurate... I love this novel and it warmed when I read it a second time. It is beautifully achieved, cunningly relaxed, and reveals considerable emotional depth... The Man Booker Prize would be no more than its due" (Daily Telegraph)

"This is a fine and hilarious book... Mr Amis has always been a stimulating writer, and someone who gives a distinctive colouring to certain times in our lives. "The Pregnant Widow" is Amis at his absolute and unique best" (The Economist)

"Amis writes thrillingly well... [The Pregnant Widow] delivers fantastic enjoyment... It is funny, clever and knowing" (Daily Mail)

An Italian poolside, Summer, 1970. Sex is very much on everyone's mind. The girls are acting like boys and the boys are going on acting like boys. Keith Nearing - a bookish twenty year old, in that much disputed territory between five foot six and five foot seven - is struggling to twist feminism towards his own ends. Torn between three women, his scheming doesn't come off quite as he expects.

And now in the twenty first century, as Keith reflects on that summer holiday, the aftershocks of the sexual revolution finally catch up with him.

The Pregnant Widow is gloriously risqué and ferociously funny. It is Martin Amis at his fearless best.