What could he do but accept the disturbing extent to which memory was fictional and hope that the fiction lay at the service of a truth less richly represented by the original facts?

I've been reading one of these novels a year and have really enjoyed each one thus far, although I would say that the first volume, Never Mind, was my favourite. Patrick shares the stage in this book with a variety of different characters, each of who are attending a large party, and we see each of them interacting with one another. St. Aubyn is a brilliant writer, capable of making you laugh one moment and delivering a shocking, excruciating blow in the next, and I always fly through these books, closing the final page feeling sad that I won't be seeing Patrick again for another year. I think I mentioned in my review of the first book that the reading experience will always be a little dissatisfying with these books if you read them one at a time and regard them as separate, individual works. They have so many gaps when you read them in this way and they read like a segment as opposed to a whole story, so I'm not sure how different my experience would be if I read them all in one go like one big novel.