Strange Places, Questionable People

The first volume of autobiography from legendary foreign correspondent, John Simpson.

Since the 1970s, John Simpson has travelled the world to report on the most significant events of our time. From being punched in the stomach by Harold Wilson on one of his first days as a reporter, to escaping summary execution in Beirut, flying into Tehran with the returning Ayatollah Khomeini, and narrowly avoiding entrapment by a beautiful Czech secret agent, Simpson has had an astonishingly eventful career. In 1989 he witnessed the Tiananmen Square massacre, the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of Communism throughout Eastern Europe and, only weeks later, in South Africa, the release of Nelson Mandela.

In Strange Places, Questionable People, Simpson recounts these stories with candid honesty. With his uncanny knack for being in the right place at the right time, this autobiography offers a ringside seat to every major event in recent global history.

'So vivid I could feel my heart beating' – Jonathan Mirsky, The Spectator

'Great stories, sometimes harrowing, sometimes hilarious' – The Daily Telegraph

The fascinating stories continue in John Simpson's second volume of autobiography, A Mad World, My Masters.