Product Description

On 13 November 2001, John Simpson and a BBC news crew walked into Kabul and the liberation of the Afghan capital was broadcast to a waiting world. It was the end of a sustained campaign against the Taliban, a campaign that Simpson had covered from the beginning, despite appalling difficulties and, often, great danger. In this, his third riveting volume of autobiography, John Simpson focuses on how journalists set about finding the stories that make the headlines. It is quintessential Simpson: vivid, utterly absorbing and written with all the care and lucidity of his reporting style. 'Great stories told with great gusto...an easy and rewarding read' - Jon Snow, "Daily Mail".

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #151044 in Books
• Published on: 2003-05-02
• Format: Unabridged
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 480 pages

Review
'Great stories told with great gusto...an easy and rewarding read' Jon Snow, Daily Mail.

BBC reporter John Simpson seems to have taken over from Kate Adie as chief of the flak jackets. He's certainly needed plenty of protection in recent years, with frontline adventures and terrorist threats galore to be faced almost daily. This third volume of his autobiography opens with the BBC's world affairs editor arriving on the outskirts of Kabul in autumn 2001, when the Taliban government was in shoot-on-sight mode. Would the Taliban forces fire on him? 'There was no way of finding out except to try it,' Simpson writes. So he walked into the city, becoming the first Western journalist to do so since the start of George W Bush's 'war on terror'. His descriptions of journalists doggedly researching their stories against enormous odds are jawdropping. On one occasion he crossed the Afghan border dressed as a woman - discovery would almost certainly have meant summary execution. Simpson does not see himself as a hero, simply a news-gatherer whose integrity is never up for negotiation. He writes as vividly as a novelist, bringing people and scenes to life in the way a two-minute slot on TV does not allow, and betrays a modesty not always associated with media stars, paying due deference to members of his team and those who sometimes risk their lives to help. Packed with anecdote, colourful characters and remarkable incidents, this is reporting of the highest order. (Kirkus UK)

From the Back Cover
PRAISE FOR JOHN SIMPSON

'What amazing tales he has to tell and with what enthralling vividness' Daily Mail

'The range of his travels is staggering...Never less than entertaining, sometimes moving and often funny' Sunday Telegraph

'Great stories, sometimes harrowing, sometimes hilarious' Daily Telegraph

About the Author
John Simpson is the BBC's World Affairs Editor. He has twice been the Royal Television Society's Journalist of the Year and won countless other major television awards. He has written several books, including five volumes of autobiography, Strange Places, Questionable People , A Mad World, My Masters, News from No Man's Land and Not Quite World's End and a childhood memoir, Days from a Different World. The Wars Against Saddam, his account of the West's relationship with Iraq and his two decades reporting on that relationship encompassing two Gulf Wars and the fall of Saddam Hussein, is also published by Pan Macmillan. He lives in London with his South African wife, Dee, and their son, Rafe.

Customer Reviews

Excellent Reporter - Not sure the same can be said as a writer
I have just read, or rather struggled through this book. Whilst John is obviously an extremely intelligent and brave man, with experiences to write about that most of us can only imagine - I really had difficulty getting into this book.

I suppose the thing that I struggled with most is the pious, sanctimonious style of his writing. I felt at times that I was being talked down to by a slightly full of themselves teacher!

It is worth reading for the stories (sorry I know that John hates them to be called stories), that he tells. Afghanistan which is the centrepiece of this book seems a fascinating, albeit slightly scary place!

Just buy it
Don't listen to those who say the style is flawed. This is Simpson's best book and details how the Afghan guerrillas and the BBC liberated Kabul before the Americans. It is fascinating and easy to read.

John Simpson
Typical John Simpson. I know that he writes about the BBC a lot, but that's not really surprising as he's worked for Aunty most of his professional career. His writing style may be very conversational, but that adds to his books' personal, almost intimate, approach. As much as anything else, it's particularly nice for a journalist to take a swipe at his own, often pompous and self-congratulatory, profession.