CONFESSIONS

Thoughtful witty occasionally comic often effortlessly profound not a conventional journalistic memoir Sunday Times If you value the perspective and judgment of one who has covered often from the frontline the major events of the past four decades then snap up a copy Mail on Sunday A book brimming with surprises and insight Nicholas Coleridge Edward Stourton was born into a life of privilege The son of expat parents in colonial Nigeria Ed was sent back to Britain to be educated by Benedictine monks at Ampleforth at the time when it was latter revealed the school and monastery were the setting for serial abuse cases He then went up to Cambridge where his life as an undergraduate gave him access to a network of future ministers judges and newspaper editors As a young journalist he reported first from party conferences and picket lines and then from war zones witnessing the events making international headlines from Haiti to Hong Kong before returning home to join the infighting on BBC Radio 4 s Today During this time the Empire has given way to the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement men only clubs have been replaced by Me Too and instead of a choice selection