Lochinvar" 1959 PORTER, Graham
$150
PORTER, Graham
[60] pp.
Thomas Y. Crowell Company
1959
Illustrated by Vasiliu
VG/ VG
Dashing young Lochinvar, a social-register dachshund, will steal your heart in one of the cleverest adult picture (and text) books to come along in many a year. And Vasiliu's hilarious drawings capture the spirit of the sophisticated canine set and their equally abandoned owners. For here is an exposé of Lochinvar's giddy life with "Mumsy"--a disarming divorcee, the former Mrs. Rippingham Cavanaugh III. Women envy her. Children adore her. Even Wall Street men of distinction dream of finding her tucked into their Christmas stockings. Why? Because Mumsy not only has a million dollars but she's built that way as well.
Mumsy's friends (and even her servants) are equally beguiling "characters." Her ex-husband has been banished to the Yale Club where he Whiffenpoofs away his lonely hours with other ex-wayward sons of Old Eli. But on hand to vie for Mumsy's affections is Sir Kedzie-Cowles, who sports an utterly devastating mustache and a walking stick which holds six fluid ounces, a jolly arrangement indeed because Mumsy is on a diet of mostly martinis. Lochnvar's own love affair is hardly so rewarding--his Afghan lady friend is as tall as a baby giraffe. Life, however, has its compensations. He belongs to the Bone-of-the-Month Club; he is always welcome at Hattie Carnegie's and the Chase Manhattan Bank; his tranquilizers are candy coated, and Mumsy's heart is as big as the sky itself.
Their Christmas party turns out to be the high point of the year. Too high, really! Even a woman of the world like Mumsy can find herself blushing.
But in the end we promise that you, too, will say, with Mumsy, "Lochinvar, I love you!"