In spite of what we must technically call Thomas Tryon's prose, his study of a Garbo character, a child prodigy, a failed actress and a decrepit Ronald Colman type, from Hollywood figures who are loosely associated in a particular film, has a curious, even an unaccountable readability. It appeals to that part of one's nature, at least if you were brought up on the films rather than the television, which rejoiced as the organ disappeared and the credits flicked up at the prospect of well-organised, nicely balanced dreams, of appalling acting, primitive morality, and the kind of suspense which could be relied on not to shock your susceptibilities but only to caress your expectations. The plots of the four contes of which Crowned Heads is composed certainly conform to this last point. Fedora-Garbo arranges her own immortality with the aid of an unknown daughter. Bobbit the child prodigy...