FALL: THE MYSTERY OF ROBERT MAXWELL

Ghislaine Maxwell and her tainted association with Jeffrey Epstein is one the most famous living Maxwells today, but her father, Robert Maxwell, the former media mogul is a fascinating enigma that John Preston investigates in his latest book ‘Fall: The Mystery of Robert Maxwell’. Preston’s story-telling makes an exciting and jaw-dropping tale. It's a pacy account and a great alternative Wild Card for book clubs.

To understand Maxwell’s ‘fall’, Preston takes us back to his humble and desperate beginning that appears to have shaped his life in business and politics, as well as relationships. Born an Orthodox Jew in Czechoslovakia we quickly learn about Maxwell’s drive to survive: imprisoned during the war as a child, he lost most of his family in the Holocaust, fought in WW2 for which he was decorated with a Military Cross and was involved in espionage. Maxwell went on to become a Labour MP and a successful businessmen but it is his tales of survival as a young man and his personal tragedies that we as readers get the chance to reconsider his story and his ability to take risks, dupe his rivals and made him a tour de force.

Author of ‘The Dig’ and ‘A Very English Scandal’, John Preston interviewed and sourced a weighty number of individuals making this all the more credible and entertaining, presenting layers of character analysis of not only what he achieved but how he got there and why. We also get the chance to see how this successful and powerful individual deceived and played the establishment, the banking world, the media and even his own family.

Most of us remember how this story ends (falling off his yacht) but it is the mystery of his life and the circumstances surrounding his death that provides a compulsive and fascinating read.

Presented in over forty bite sized chapters the Den enjoyed the narrative style and pace. A book that just kept giving.