The past is never dead, it isn’t even past
HMS Belfast - the Town-class light cruiser, originally launched in 1938 is open to visitors once more. The vessel saw convoy duty, survived the Battle of North Cape and took part in the destruction of the Scharnhorst during WW2. The Belfast has long been moored on the...
58 years ago JFK gave one of his best speeches. Speaking to huge crowds in West Berlin, he called on the free world to stand by Berliners divided by the Berlin Wall and threatened by their Communist neighbours. “All free men, wherever they may live, are citizens of...
Summer Reads from Aspects of HistoryPaul BernardiTaking a well-earned break from the adventures of Beobrand in his much-loved Bernicia Chronicles series, Matthew Harffy moves forward the best part of one hundred and fifty years in this, his most recent and...
Books Click on any of the books covers below to either buy or get more information on Amazon Book Reviews[dpdfg_filtergrid custom_query="advanced" multiple_cpt="book_reviews" use_taxonomy_terms="on" multiple_taxonomies="name_of_author" include_terms="222"...
Books on Bond 5 - Ian Fleming, by Andrew Lycett, 1995. Lycett is an accomplished and celebrated literary biographer; his books on Kipling, Dylan Thomas and Wilkie Collins are close to definitive. He brings the same levels of research and insight to his book on...
Detailed yet pacy, insightful and informative, Richard Greene (no relation) has written a thoroughly enjoyable one-volume biography of Graham Greene. The novelist has attracted plenty of labels over the years: Catholic, communist, womaniser, depressive, genius. What...
This is the true story of Agent Sonya – wife, mother and Soviet spy. Ursula Kuczynski was born into a secular Jewish family in Germany. Like many Jews of her generation, there was no choice in 1930s Europe in the ideological struggle between Communism and Fascism. It...
It was the usual grey and cold day in Cold War Berlin, November 1973, with the first really cold east winds sweeping in across the flat plains of Eastern Europe that stretch as far as the Urals in the Soviet Union. Thinking about nothing in particular, and about to...
Intelligent, accessible, and entertaining – William Boyd’s Trio was always going to be one of the novels of the year. Boyd is often rightly lauded for his craftsmanship, in relation to the structure and style of his works, but not enough credit is given to him for his...
The two heavily armed carriages rattled slowly into the central square of Tiflis (now known as Tbilisi), the state capital of Georgia. Seated resplendent in one of the carriages was the State Bank’s cashier. The other carriage was packed with police and soldiers....
