Stephen Bungay was interviewed in the programme on the Battle of Britain compared by Ewan McGregor with his RAF pilot brother Colin
BBC Programme with horrible destruction by ISIS of archaeological treasures in Iraq
Review Guardian Jul15 Not in Stonnington 25Jul15
Excellent and incredibly well-researched book. Read copy from Stonnington Jul15
Review Age 27Jun15 Not in Stonnington
The Whistleblower: Sex Trafficking, Military Contractors, and One Woman's Fight for Justice by Kathryn Bolkovac
After seeing part of film The Whistleblower
Referred to in Sophia_Turkiewicz's film Once my mother watched on 25Jan15
Mentioned in Family Romance by John Lanchester read Aug14
Mentioned in an insiders article about WW1. Available Prahran
Interviewed in the SBS programme Hitler's children. Other books der Vater and Meine Deutsche Mutter which do not appear to be in English
FT 31May14 review filed. Read Stonnington copy Aug14. Agree with one crit that a reader needs a knowledge of people and events prior to Jun89 to fully grasp the book. Nevertheless a good read with some disjointed parts where continuity seems to wander.
Short review in FT 24May14 Not files
FT 26Apr14 The Murder Bag, by Tony Parsons, Century, RRP£9.99, 384 pages
Tony Parsons, author of the bestselling novel Man and Boy (1999), has taken a new direction. Perhaps in reaction to what detractors call his laddish fiction, he has reinvented himself as a gritty crime writer.
If you are feeling shell-shocked from the barrage of novels featuring tough maverick cops – and are convinced that nothing new can invigorate the genre – The Murder Bag will provide the antidote. Bolshie London detective Max Wolfe is investigating a homicide in which a banker’s throat has been cut; a second victim is a homeless heroin addict. The connection: an upscale private school.
Yes, we’ve met detectives at loggerheads with their daughters (as here) before, from Wallander to Rebus. But there are two things that elevate Parsons’ novel: parenting is his speciality subject and it’s treated with a nuance largely absent elsewhere in crime fiction. And Parsons, a quintessential London writer, evokes his city with pungency and élan.
Review by Barry Forshaw
Tony Parsons, author of the bestselling novel Man and Boy (1999), has taken a new direction. Perhaps in reaction to what detractors call his laddish fiction, he has reinvented himself as a gritty crime writer.
If you are feeling shell-shocked from the barrage of novels featuring tough maverick cops – and are convinced that nothing new can invigorate the genre – The Murder Bag will provide the antidote. Bolshie London detective Max Wolfe is investigating a homicide in which a banker’s throat has been cut; a second victim is a homeless heroin addict. The connection: an upscale private school.
Yes, we’ve met detectives at loggerheads with their daughters (as here) before, from Wallander to Rebus. But there are two things that elevate Parsons’ novel: parenting is his speciality subject and it’s treated with a nuance largely absent elsewhere in crime fiction. And Parsons, a quintessential London writer, evokes his city with pungency and élan.
Review by Barry Forshaw
Review FT 26Apr14 The First Rule of Survival, by Paul Mendelson, Constable Robinson, RRP£12.99, 400 pages
Paul Mendelson’s expertise in the poker field is enshrined in several bestselling books on the subject, and he has clearly been salting away observations of human behaviour acquired in that discipline. His debut novel bristles with a command of language and narrative that suggests someone with a slew of novels to their name.
A decade ago in Cape Town, three white schoolboys were abducted – a mystery that has not been solved. Colonel Vaughn de Vries finds a cold case getting hot when the corpses of two white teenagers are found and the troubled policeman becomes obsessed with bringing a vicious criminal to justice. Mendelson, who writes the FT’s weekly Bridge column, demonstrates a sense of place to rival old hands such as Deon Meyer (and, like him, introduces racism as a key element).
Some will have trouble with the uncompromising directions in which he takes his narrative but most will find this to be authoritative and unblinkered fare.
Review by Barry Forshaw
Paul Mendelson’s expertise in the poker field is enshrined in several bestselling books on the subject, and he has clearly been salting away observations of human behaviour acquired in that discipline. His debut novel bristles with a command of language and narrative that suggests someone with a slew of novels to their name.
A decade ago in Cape Town, three white schoolboys were abducted – a mystery that has not been solved. Colonel Vaughn de Vries finds a cold case getting hot when the corpses of two white teenagers are found and the troubled policeman becomes obsessed with bringing a vicious criminal to justice. Mendelson, who writes the FT’s weekly Bridge column, demonstrates a sense of place to rival old hands such as Deon Meyer (and, like him, introduces racism as a key element).
Some will have trouble with the uncompromising directions in which he takes his narrative but most will find this to be authoritative and unblinkered fare.
Review by Barry Forshaw
Oldie Review of Books Spring 2014 P17
GW 7Mar14 Not in Stonnington 1Apr14
Recommended by Nicholas Shakespeare The Week 18Jan14. If anyone needs a virtuoso example of what fiction can do that history can’t, I would direct them to this novel. It renders Vichy France absolutely palpable in a way I have not read before: in all its abysmal compromises, hatreds, self-loathings, betrayals, silences.