The Rise of the Nouveaux Riches, by J. Mordaunt Crook (John Murray, £15 in the UK).

Maybe in a century's time, someone will write a book like this about Ireland's current crop of nouveaux riches. If so, it is sure to be a fascinating read, because F. Mordaunt Crook's tour through arriviste aesthetic sensibilities 100 years ago is an irresistible and informative delight. It is a consistent characteristic of the entrepreneur that whereas he shows great imagination in making his money, he possesses absolutely none when spending it. Crook's protagonists, like today's Irish counterparts, all tended to build and decorate houses in the same style, one that manages to be both bland and flashy, and devoid of any personal flair. Their enormous homes, predominantly hideous fauxFlorentine palazzi in London and equally flashy Louis XV-style country houses in the home counties, are now largely gone. The book's many pages of photographs show how little has been lost and the same will no doubt be true of the properties currently occupied by this country's millionaires.