THE RARE AND THE BEAUTIFUL: The Art, Loves, and Lives of the Garman Sisters

Connolly, the daughter of writer Cyril Connolly, has a bit of an in with bohemian England of the 1920s and '30s. As a window into that era, she chooses four of the nine Garman siblings: sisters Mary, Kathleen and Lorna, and (despite the subtitle) their brother Douglas. Just writing a descriptive sentence about the four is an exercise in name-dropping: among their spouses and lovers were artists, writers and patrons who shaped the 20th century, including Roy Campbell, Jacob Epstein, Vita Sackville-West, Peggy Guggenheim and Lucian Freud. Perhaps because she is a child of that generation, Connolly focuses on their family lives and the numerous ways they flouted the conventions of marriage and child-rearing. The Garmans, who were raised by servants and sent away to school, seemed unable to deal with the realities of keeping house and especially raising children. Connolly captures this irresponsibility as both a personal and a generational pattern. Beyond the personal issues, Connolly doesn't quite capture the qualities that made these siblings special. Despite their apparent talents and passion for life, they come across as people who were famous for knowing famous people. But there's an improvisational quality to their lives that must have been entrancing for their generation as it broke from tradition and forged a lifestyle and aesthetic for the modern age. Photos. (Aug. 17)