I love the dustjacket on this book.

At first glance, and maybe as seen from a little distance, you could be forgiven for thinking this book is somewhat past its sell be date. The jacket looks as if it has been stained with time, and it looks as if it has been torn through so much that you can see the cover through the jacket. This is of course an illusion to connote the idea of age.

There is a line drawing in the bottom left corner of the jacket of a senior gentleman having a cheeky wee Beaujolais and a laugh, in the garden with the Devil. Up in the right hand corner, the sun is shining down on both if them. though with a slightly worried look on its face.

This sets the scene for a bit of mischief.

This book is probably best read if, fifty odd years ago you read 'Now We Are Six' by A.A. Milne., for at least you will be familiar with the layout of the book and the rhyme and metre, which this book, Now We Are Sixty, emulates.

Rather than being a book for six year olds though, it is clearly, by the title, a book for sixty year olds, or more generally those who have experienced their earlier years and are now experiencing the 'joys' of the latter years.

The book is at once a parody and a homage to A.A. Milne. Not only are the words stylistically similar, the illustrations, by David Eccles, bear a resemblance to those of E.H. Sheppard.

Where Milne's book explored the things that a child experienced and thought, this book wittily explores the senior years and the new experiences constantly put upon those who in 'their day' may have enjoyed a slower pace, in a less liberal world.

The verses are of course tongue in cheek, but there is no doubt the subject matter is no fiction.

Compare AA Milne's original Buckingham Palace with the Christipher Matthew version

Buckingham Palace
by A.A. Milne

They're changing guard at Buckingham Palace -
Christopher Robin went down with Alice.
Alice is marrying one of the guard.
"A soldier's life is terribly hard,"
Says Alice.

and now the Christopher Matthew version:

"They're changing sex at Buckingham Palace!"
Murgatroyd mutters with undisguised malice.
"Roger is marrying one of the guard -
Bugger whose bearskin reeks of pomade,
Called Alice.'

Do you get the picture now?

This is ideal Birthday gift stuff. It is a bit of a giggle for anyone, so don't wait until you are sixty before reading it.