Honey for the bears

Paul Hussey, an antiques dealer from Sussex and his American wife Belinda have arrived in Leningrad. Paul is trying to raise some money by illegally selling dresses to a people rich in cosmonauts but poor in consumer goods. But the logic of Soviet economics proves more dangerous than he ever imagined. Moreover, Leningrad turns out to be a city in which daylight dawns in the middle of the night. Anthony Burgess's hilarious and inventive comedy takes off when Paul learns some unnerving truths about his own sexual nature and that of Belinda. And now she's receiving the keenest attention in the hands of the Russian bears from the State Medical Service. Honey for the Bears is one of Burgess's most accessible novels, and is a strong candidate for the funniest. It is sheer reading pleasure.