Holiday brochures leave expeditioners cold. For them the lure is exotic: tracking down striped hyenas in Kenya, and investigating their diet by collecting and drying their droppings, or befriending Chamacoco fishermen in Paraguay.

BOOKS FOR CHRISTMASCHAPTER & VERSE2 Pamela Norris's beautifully produced Through the Glass Window Shines the Sun (Little, Brown pounds 13.99) brings together verse and painting from the Middle Ages. Illustrations from illuminated manuscripts accompany texts culled from Boccaccio, Chaucer, Malory and Anon: "Green groweth the Holly" is Henry VIII's charming contribution - a paean to fidelity, the hypocritical old so-and-so.

Does David McAlmont deserve to be big? Ask anyone who's heard McAlmont and Butler's number 8 hit "Yes". This man has an extraordinary voice, the voice of a crazed Dionne Warwick. He's also beautiful, black and gay. Looking into life's crystal ball for a moment, does that spell STARDOM, or TROUBLE?

Most of us live in cities and constantly plot our escape. But now, rural interests are resisting the invaders

BUNHILL

Georgetown - President Cheddi Jagan of Guyana designated a large swath of territory south of the capital as an environmental disaster zone after cyanide from a Canadian-owned gold mine seeped into the Omai river, which joins the Essequibo, Guyana's largest river. Mr Jagan pledged to take all possible steps to contain the contamination from the deadly poison that was discovered at the Omai gold mine last Saturday.

PHIL DAVISON

Ray Illingworth, who is an amiably talkative man, does not like press conferences. He has rejected several requests that, as the chairman of selectors, he should appear before the media at the close of play on each day.

THE CREATURE IN THE MAP by Charles Nicholl, Cape pounds 20

Harry Mullan meets Britain's ageing lord of the ring who has earned res pect the hard way

As the elder statesman of black actors in Britain, Norman Beaton was a lifelong champion of their rights and opportunities in theatre, film and television. Beaton himself was involved in many ``firsts'' in all those media, although it was as the P eckhambarber in the Channel 4 situation comedy Desmond's that he gained international fame.

Out of america

THREE reasons are usually given when a cult implodes: isolation, apocalpytic fervour and a charismatic leader. However, if they were all that was needed, far more new religions would end in mass suicide like this week's in Switzerland. One additional factor is needed, which by its nature is unpredictable.

INDIAN hearts were beating a little less fearfully yesterday when Curtly Ambrose withdrew from the West Indies' forthcoming tour of the subcontinent because of a persistent shoulder injury which requires surgery.