In 48 wide-ranging essays on literary, cultural and political topics, from the Bill of Rights to Frank Sinatra to the novelists Dawn Powell and Sinclair Lewis, Vidal displays "a carefree touch and a humorous air," according to our reviewer, Paul Berman, who last year found the collection uneven but at its best "lively, instructive, lucid and amusing".
BEST: Lively exchanges of information about "scammers and nonperformers in finance".
The wines we liked best were lively and refreshing, with some degree of finesse.
Those we liked best were lively, balanced, nuanced and complex, with the sort of lithe agility that makes them great with food.
The best are lively and energetic, with malty flavors of coffee, toffee and chocolate that entice you back to the glass.
In any case, Mr. Wilczek said that he thinks the best, most lively fires come from an assortment of woods, a kind of fireplace cocktail.
I know it was a Monday, because it was the day the dustbin men came …" Which makes it all the more impressive that, despite this, I found the first chapter of this novel to be one of the best, most lively and funny openings I've read in ages.
At its best, in the lively Allemande and Gigue, her style can be illuminating.
"AT THEIR best, they are lively classrooms of democracy," says Richard Norton Smith, a historian who specialises in presidential libraries.
The combination was at its best in a lively tangle of rice noodles with cucumber, cilantro and carrot, dressed in a spicy sweet-and-sour vinaigrette.
The masterpieces of the age are unquestionably Roger North's biographies (not published until 1742, 1744) of his three brothers: Francis, the lord chief justice, "my best brother"; the lively merchant-adventurer Sir Dudley, his favourite; and the neurotic scholar John.
