Victoria Coren

Charlie Skelton

Vicky and Charlie, twenty-somethings, one the son of a vicar, the other the daughter of a much loved Radio 4 and Times columnist, friends for years but never boyfriend/girlfriend, decide to make a hardcore porn movie. Vicky and Charlie are best friends who used to co-review hardcore porn movies. After a year of fat lechers, bored hookers and clunky dialogue, they said, "Hang on, we could make a better film than this ourselves." What was to stop them? Only their conservative families, stammering English reserve, and total lack of experience. They set off at once. This is the extraordinary and hilarious story of their journey from a sofa in North London, through the heart of the sex industry in California, to their own film set in Amsterdam. What happens when a 'nice girl' falls in love with a rent-boy, and a vicar's son attempts to film a gang-bang? Vicky and Charlie learned to see the world through new eyes, and the sex-workers learned how to play cribbage. And together they produced perhaps the most baffling skinflick in history.

How We Tried to Make the Greatest Porn Film Ever

Once More, with Feeling

In September 2006, Victoria Coren won the European Poker Championship, and with it a cool one million dollars. Overnight, she became one of the world's most famous players. But how did she do it? In For Richer, For Poorer, Victoria Coren's long-awaited poker memoir, she answers this question. It is an intensely honest story of twenty years of obsession, of highs and lows, wins and losses, friendships, power plays, loneliness and addiction. Coren takes us from the grimy underworld of illegal cash games to the high glamour of Monte Carlo and Las Vegas, vividly capturing the incredible excitement of a poker match and getting to the heart of why poker has become the world's most popular card game. It is a razor-sharp, accessible, entertaining, and intensely gripping story.

A Love Affair with Poker

For Richer, For Poorer

Giles Coren

Alan Coren

The Queen at a loose end playing I-Spy, QPR fans arguing at the cheese counter, prank phone calls to Mao Tse-Tung, the Roman tax collector Glutinus Sinus dealing with the mud-caked Britons, Gatling guns, an Italian driving school, herons, hearing aids, hosepipe bans, talking parrots . . . Welcome to the wonderful world of the late, great Alan Coren.

The Essential Alan Coren

Chocolate and Cuckoo Clocks

In September 2006, Victoria Coren won a million dollars on the European Poker Tour. In this, her long-awaited memoir, Coren tells the story of that victory, but also of a twenty-year obsession with the game. It is a journey which has taken Coren from a secret culture of illegal cash games to the high-stakes glamour of Las Vegas and Monte Carlo, and brought with it friendship, laughter and money, but also loneliness, heart-break and defeat. With disarming honesty, Victoria Coren lays all of this bare. For Richer, For Poorer also tells the story of the poker revolution. How did this cult card game, populated by a small community of colourful and eccentric players, move from the back streets to the mainstream in a few short years? It is a fascinating story from a trusted insider.

For Richer, for Poorer

Miserable at an elegant day school for girls, Victoria Coren finds an escape in the mysterious world of poker. Twenty years later, she has won a million dollars and forgotten to have children. What price adventure? This is a true story of happiness and heartbreak, smoke and mirrors, bright lights and shady characters. It is a memoir of friendship and belonging, love and loss. It might also teach you how to win a million . . .

Victoria Coren

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