The Ironist

Peter Scotchmer dives into two great reads- Saroo Brierley's contemporary true story 'Lion' and Rudyard Kipling's classic novel 'Kim' during his own travels through the Indian subcontinent. While in India on family business, I picked up two outstanding books about the...

The story is told by his son Dylan of a memorable exchange between Dylan’s father, the Canadian writer William Bell, famous for his novel Forbidden City, and Dylan’s sister Megan. Megan had been reprimanded for some unspecified childish misdemeanour or other, and had...

The Art Thief by Michael Finkel : A Book Review   This year, 2023, has seen the publication of Michael Finkel’s The Art Thief, a riveting true account of the escapades of Stephane Breitwieser, a native of Alsace, and probably the most prolific art thief in history...

Richard Ovenden, Burning the Books: A History of Knowledge Under Attack, (John Murray, 2021) Kenneth Baker, On the Burning of Books: How Flames Fail to Destroy the Written Word, (Unicorn, 2016) The aim of those vandals who burn books in an open forum is arguably to...

  We have the great Charter of Rights and Freedoms, “the highest law in the land” we are told. This video clip (above) is almost painful to watch with...

If you haven’t seen it yet, Happy Valley is a television series you should see. The last of the series just ended so I want to promote it before it disappears under another surfeit of maudlin Disney rehashes which seem to never stop. You really do want to stay up another hour to see the next episode.