In this first U.S. publication of a richly comic classic—originally published in England in the 1920s—the pitfalls and vicissitudes of home building are presented in sharp and unforgettable detail, in the form of letters to and from the architect—a hapless young man named James Spinlove, who, in his valiant attempts to create the Honeywood mansion for Sir Leslie Brash, encounters a motley collection of contractors, surveyors, plumbers and town planners—to say nothing of intensely litigious lawyers, and Sir Leslie Brash himself, along with his good lady. There are letters from the subsidiary but crucial characters named Nibnose & Rasper, Mr Snitch, V. Potch and Hoochkoft the surveyor of bricks, among others. ...full of human nature; and full of useful information lightly conveyed, for everybody concerned with domestic architecture. -- Arnold Bennett