The house of Hervey - Michael De-La-Noy

Was there ever a family like the Herveys? John, 7th Marquess of Bristol, hit the headlines in the 1970s and 80s when he squandered much of the family's fortune and possessions, later becoming a hopeless drug addict and dying aged only 44. He went to prison twice, and after three years of marriage left his wife in a Bentley hanging over a cliff.

A much earlier John, Lord Hervey of Ickworth, spitefully nicknamed 'Lord Fanny' by Pope, set the family ball rolling with his riveting Memoirs of the Reign of George II and his love affair with Stephen Fox. Frederick, who became Bishop of Derry and began the building of the family's great 18th- century mansion, Ickworth House, in Suffolk, was denounced by George III as 'that wicked prelate'. His daughter Lady Elizabeth Foster, became part of an extraordinary mnage
trois at Chatsworth, mother of two illegitimate children and, after the famous Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire's death, second wife of the 5th Duke of Devonshire.

Michael De-la-Noy's enormously enjoyable romp through the Herveys' reckless history reveals a family whose great gifts as builders, diarists and in recent times astute businessmen have been offset by their bizarre exploits, resulting in a story by turns comic and tragic, but never dull.