Moab is My Washpot, by Stephen Fry (Arrow, £6.99 in UK)

Like its author, this autobiography is amiable and witty, but as to why it took over the bestseller list when it came out in …

Like its author, this autobiography is amiable and witty, but as to why it took over the bestseller list when it came out in hardback and is proceeding to do the same in soft covers, that's something of a mystery. Presumably it has to do with Fry's "cards on the table" discussion of his troubled teenage years, when he made off with the credit card of a family friend and ran cheerfully amok before being arrested, or the early years of his homosexuality, including his touchingly celibate crush on a fellow schoolboy. File under: pleasant, easygoing, sometimes a tad too relentlessly clever. Like its author, in fact.

Arminta Wallace

Arminta Wallace

Arminta Wallace is a former Irish Times journalist