Featured on The Book Show on Sky Arts on 22 October 2009.

This is the life story of Harold Evans, one of the most respected investigative journalists of recent times and sadly part of a dying breed. From humble Lancashire beginnings to becoming editor of one of the biggest newspapers in Britain,  Evans' story is a fascinating and inspiring one.

Synopsis

From a wartime beach in Wales to the gleaming skyscrapers of twenty-first-century Manhattan, the extraordinary career of Fleet Street legend Harold Evans has spanned five decades of tumultuous social, political and creative change. Just how did a working class Lancashire boy, who failed the eleven-plus, rise to a position where he could so effectively give voice to the unheard? Born in the bleak years between the wars in the sprawl of Greater Manchester into a thrifty, diligent and loving family, Evans inherited only the privilege of his parents' example. Theirs was a work ethic that led Evans through night school classes, national service and a passionate commitment to regional life, and, finally, to his unassailably successful editorship of one of our greatest newspapers, the Sunday Times. Whether unpicking the murderous chaos of Bloody Sunday, pursuing a foreign correspondent's murderers or uncovering the atrocity of Thalidomide, this consummate newsman evokes his contagious passion: for the real story and the truth.

Reviews

'"Inspiring" is an overused word. This truly is. Anyone who feels cynical about public life in general, and journalists in particular, should drink down this wonderful book in a single gulp. Harry Evans was the great crusader of the twentieth century British press. His memoir, which is also jaw-dropping social history, is the best education possible in what true journalism's all about' Andrew Marr

About the Author

Harold Evans was editor of the Sunday Times from 1967 to 1981, and became responsible for its crusading style of investigative reporting, he has lived in the USA since 1984. More books by this author Author 'Like for Like' recommendation