Мэттью Пэррис — новинки

Following their acclaimed Parting Shots, Matthew Parris and Andrew Bryson bring together further sharp-eyed, thoughtful and often hilarious despatches from British Ambassadors abroad. Packed with curious and revealing stories (some once thought to be urban myths), including the horse given by the Turkmenistan authorities to John Major, which had to be rescued from a Moscow railway, and the Spanish Ambassador's odd behaviour in the Algerian desert, this book also contains fascinating glimpses and insights into diplomatic - and undiplomatic - affairs. Showing our representatives abroad at their best and sometimes worst - whether rude or sympathetic, clever or confused - it shines a light on how we British have seen the world . . . and how the world has too often seen us.

When leaving a foreign posting, Britain's ambassadors were encouraged to write a valedictory despatch until the practice was abolished in 2006. Unlike the usual style of the diplomatic bag, these last reports from foreign posts were unbuttoned, indiscreet and often very funny. There was much settling of scores, some poking fun of foreigners, a degree of moaning about the privations of Embassy life - and sometimes a bit of serious analysis too. Based on a very successful BBC radio series, Matthew Parris, who once worked for the Foreign Office and had the task of distributing the despatches, and Andrew Bryson have compiled an always entertaining and frequently hilarious volume of the best of them.

It's amazing how often politicians' most public words come back to haunt them, and "Mission Accomplished" is a priceless treasure-trove of their verbal blunders, indiscretions, regrettable promises, about-turns, deceptions, lies...and just plain stupidity. Ranging across the centuries and across the globe this salutary and hugely funny book comes bang up-to-date with all those immortal lines our leaders have made into classics.

Paperback. Pub Date: 1993 08 Pages: 248 in Publisher: Orion Paperbacks Inca-Kola is the funny. Absorbing account of Matthew Parriss fourth trip to Peru on a bizarre holiday which takes him among bandits. Prostitutes. peasants and riots He and his three companions seem to head into trouble. not away from it. and he describes the troubles. curiosities and wonders they meet with the spell-binding fascination of a traveller relating adventures over the campfire. 'A backpacker's classic: atmospheric. touching. instructive and compulsively readable 'The Times