Something to Answer ForWinner of the inaugural Booker Prize in 1969. It was 1956 and he was in Port Said. About these two facts Townrow was reasonably certain. He had been summoned there, to Egypt, by the widow of his deceased friend, Elie Khoury. Having been found dead in the street, she is convinced he was murdered, but nobody seems to agree with her. What of Leah Strauss, the mistress? And of the invading British paratroops? Only an Englishman, surely, would take for

He has no choice but to trust his fortunes to an American privateer a man who has no love for the British invaders

the dramas collected in this book represent the highest standard of screenplay technique and artistry

When they realise that the only verdict the local police are interested in is accidental death and a speedily closed file

teach his younger self how to be a good copper and change the outcome of a bloody rebellion

“I’m not asking you to build something impossible

to spend time with his grown-up lesbian daughter on her remote farm

and a young cadet is found butchered in the streets of Istanbul

The past never stays buried

For Thomas Hill

hence the Black Fleet of illicit ships lurking in the bay: listening stations

where the massing forces of the Sassanid Empire loom with fiery menace

Romulus and Fabiola are twins