The Specials

Martin Amis and the perils of good copy

The novelist and his peers’ current penchant for confessional memoir threatens to obscure their literary achievements

Abusing the mummy card

Whenever a woman starts whining about juggling, I want to scream and then throttle her

How the alpha half lives

The deal is: I make the dirty sexy money; you spend the money; I have dirty sex somewhere else

Losing the taste for organic

Suddenly "organic" has ceased to be a selling point and started to be a liability sales-wise

Why I salute Kelly McGillis

Even though being gay has gone from a matter of deep personal shame to pride, it’s still tough out there

Premier league whiner

Research suggests Wags aren’t all shopaholics with Southfork-style mansions in Cheshire

Attack of the babeskis

Now the leggy, gorgeous missiles have locked onto the big time: our rock stars, celebs and super-rich

Force-fed on gourmet love

Couples trying to conceive were informed that the missionary position didn’t cut the mustard

A vision of our fat future

Is obesity really a disease that needs to be treated? Rachel Johnson asks if fat is the new smoking

Madoff’s hurt them and you’re next

When we clap eyes on the Madoff victims we see ourselves, and have to fight not to look away

Losing the taste for glitz

It is hard to mourn the loss of the über-glam restaurants that sucked up to the famous

He’s fit enough for a queen

Why plump for a moth-eaten, inbred blue-blood when there’s a seductive, super-fit alternative?

A sucker for a sinner

Rather than shun those touched by a whiff of scandal, society often rushes to pay court

Hollywood’s cave girls

Forty is the new flirty

'When a woman has sex outside marriage, it's daring. When a man does it, he's just a dirty old man'

Barbie's boob job over John Cleese

A cringeworthy episode of Fawlty Towers offers a textbook example of how not to keep a man keen

Barbie’s biggest boob

This cringeworthy episode of Fawlty Towers is a textbook example of how not to keep a man keen