The Downing Street Years - Tapa dura

The appearance of Margaret Thatcher's memoirs has been one of the most eagerly awaited publishing events in many years. As this book now shows, rarely has such a sense of anticipation been so amply justified.

No prime minister of modern times has sought to change Britain and its place in the world as radically as Margaret Thatcher. Her government was, she says, about the application of a philosophy, not the implementation of an administrative programme. She sets out here with characteristic forcefulness and conviction the reasons for her beliefs and how she sought to put them into action. She gives riveting accounts of the great and critical moments of her premiership – the Falklands War, the Miner's strike, the Brighton bomb, the Westland Affair and her three election victories. Her judgements of other world statesman and her Cabinet colleagues are often brutally frank, her criticism devastating. The book ends with an account of her last days in power which as gripping as anything in thriller fiction.

This is a work intensely revealing of the mind and personality of its author: her thoroughness, her passion for change, her tenacity and her astonishing determination are evident in every chapter of the book. The impression which emerges is, as one recent commentator put it, of a world-class battleship at full steam ahead.

"A book which should be read by everyone with any interest in contemporary history of political affairs."
NORMAN TEBBIT, 'Daily Mail'

"Some things in life are priceless. So are Margaret Thatcher's guts. They have left their mark on the world. So will 'The Downing Street Years'"
BERNARD INGHAM, 'Daily Express'