All Ears

As the author of "All Ears" will freely admit, there's nothing dignified about listening to other people's conversations, especially if these are thrust upon us as we stand in crowded London bus, packed sardine-style with complete strangers shouting into their mobile phones. No one, however, has ever attempted to raise eavesdropping to an art form, or recognize what verbal gems are being thrown around us every minute of our waking urban existence. Gathered for the first time in a volume, and accompanied by Andy Watt's iconic illustrations, are Michael Holden's hit "stolen dialogues", which readers of the "Saturday Guardian" - where they were serialized since April 2005 - will immediately recognize. The locations vary - ranging from Scotland to the South Coast - but the focus is on the teeming city of London, with its noisy and multifarious inhabitants, directly presented here in all its quirkiness, showing how unusual and unscriptable everyday conversation can at times be. The book includes previously unpublished vignettes, fifteen colour illustrations by Andy Watt, scene-setting descriptions for each dialogue and a map identifying the location of each conversation.