1. Even worse, he failed to deliver recommendations that might resolve the leprous collapse of trust in government.

2. Prejudice populated the former Communist countries with hotel whores, Mercedes mafiosi, meddling priests, demagogues and asset–strippers, its unemployed peoples dwelling among processions of leprous apartment blocks.

3. Those hideous leaves, those leprous stamens, those snaking and sinister taproots, might seem repellent to us, but they all serve the purpose of sucking moisture out of the foggy air.

4. But the need for a profit after such price–slashing also ensures that the vast majority are middle–of–the–road bestsellers, which means I‘ve either read them (Life of Pi, Eve Green, Dan Brown‘s growing oeuvre) or would rather suffocate myself with my bag of Tesco Value instant mashed potato mix than do so (My Leprous Stepdad Used My Childish Buttocks as Timpani, by Dave Pelzer, I‘m 33, Single and Vomiting Bile and Desperation on to Every Page, by everyone else). Eventually, I plump for Being Jordan (a fine example of what can be achieved if you sit a hundred PR assistants at a hundred typewriters for a hundred minutes), The Ivy Chronicles (which is mad) and Piers Morgan‘s memoirs (even madder). So much for my literary tastes.