A Ringside Seat Book

Michael Brunson, as Political Editor of Independent Television News, patrolled the corridors of power in Westminster and Whitehall for 14 years in search of news stories. His familiar on-screen matter-of-fact manner now migrates to the printed page in his autobiography. While it may not contain startling revelations, he shows he has a camera's eye for revealing the broad political picture which then dissolves into the intimate close-up, like his account of Lady Thatcher wiping away tears in a televised interview a year after her resignation. Brunson, who lived out of a suitcase as a foreign correspondent before he moved to Westminster, strips away the supposed glamour of his professional calling. Even when his habitat was the Houses of Parliament he found he had not come out of the rain, as the long hours standing outside 10 Downing Street waiting for a meeting to break up and the chance of a quick televised interview testify. Brunson chronicles his period reporting politics dominated by the triumphs and tribulations of Margaret Thatcher, John Major and Tony Blair with the accomplished perception that television viewers came to expect in his televised commentaries. Mixed in with these are his own triumphs and tribulations, his scoops and his shortcomings, and they are told with a relish which demonstrates he enjoyed, well, nearly every minute of an exciting if exhausting career.--Michael HatfieldRead More