Reviews
CUU DESIGN DAVE EVANS Coolhunting
(Southbank Publishing, 0”
Current adverts for DVD box sets of flashy dross such as The OC and Friends claim that these shows are ‘funny, sexy, cool'. But what, then. does it mean to be cool? The definitions have certainly changed down the years with archetypal leathery characters such as the Fonz and Jimmy Dean now about as cool as your elder uncle dancing to Beyonce while the geeks they sneered at have come along to inherit that crown.
In this ‘guide to high design and innovation,’ it seems that ‘cool' is a darker, sillier, often uglier thing altogether, though with hints of humour or eroticism never too far away from the surface and all just a mouse click away. Take the humble doggles for example (www.doggles.com). Who wouldn’t want some neat shades or natty jewellery for their pooch? And is there anyone who‘d have to think twice about getting a toilet-based t-shirt for their kid (www.peeandpoo.com)?
Then there are spectacles made from wood, inflatable pin cushions. stickers for your iPod. vitamin enriched underwear, bamboo bikes. waterproof pool lamps and on and on it goes with two mutually exclusive ideas coming together in one whimsical moment. A prime example is the crossbrush (www.citizen-citizen.com) which can wipe away flecks of dust and cardinal sins at the same time. It all seems a little Nathan Barley and most visits to these sites will induce snorts of derision rather than gasps of wonder at the innovative glories within. Though I am tempted by www.catgee.com with its DNA profiling and storage kit. (Brian Donaldson)
MYSTERY DRAMA UCIE
WHITEHOUSE The House at Midnight (Bloomsbury) O
Employing a strategy inherently demanding that there‘s no good reason to use one paragraph to describe paintings about Greek gods when an entire page-and-a-hall Will do. Lucie Whitehouse's debut ultimater borders on the insulting. Judging by the hefty tributes on the book Jacket, we are promised compelling doses of atmosphere and suspense. but are merely landed with a stOry that annoys through its misplaced grandiosity and amazes With its sheer banality of character and dialogue. A gaggle of youngish middle-class irritants (some have ‘indie-Singer hair', others have the ‘air of the Left Bank') gather in a really big house for New Year. with a sinister weight hanging around them concerning the host '8
28 THE LIST 4—1 7 Jan 2008
family secrets. notably the deaths of his uncle and father. With the narrator being ensnared in this dangerous world. it takes 370 pages for an unbelievably lame and tension tree climax to be realised. The Lucie Whitehouse experience is one to avoid.
(Brian Donaldson)
FACTUAL, DESMOND MORRIS
The Naked Man (Jonathan Cape) O
After the international success of 2004 's The Naked Woman, it now seems fitting for Desmond Morris (zoologist and author of best-seller The Naked Ape) to turn his attention to the male frame. However, he would have been better to steer well clear, as this study of the masculine body from head to toe proves to be clunky and ill- thought—out. taking seientitic facts and twisting them to form
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sweeping statements which simply have no place in modern thought. Some of the most controversial include the idea that men are more prone to infidelity due to an inherent childlike plavliiln éss and that men are 'made gay" because they retain Juvenile characttmstics when they reach adulthood.
Harri-listed declarations aside. even
on a purely stylistic level.
The Naked Man is a disaster. its pages strewn With bland, dull
depictions, cringeworthy
cliches and an onslaught ol tact and trIVIa, adding up to an exhausting and irritating experience Keep well clear (Camilla Piai
lITERAHY CRITICISM TOM PAULIN The Secret Life of Poems
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The Director
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