Thank the lord for the dogged journalists, and MPs like Labour’s Tom Watson, for helping unravel one of the biggest outrages in recent British history; a sordid saga which is played out in this superb book which recounts how the scandal went from being the story that the media wouldn’t touch, into the story that dominated the news agenda for months on end. The book lays bare the full pernicious effects of Rupert Murdoch’s tabloids that were being run like a mafia organisation with an almost stratospheric arrogance. The lying, the bulling, the obfuscation and the sheer criminality on show here is constantly breathtaking as this most malignant of empires spread its tentacles into all walks of life, from Scotland Yard to 10 Downing Street. It makes for a gripping read (and once again I was left scratching my head at just how the former Culture Secretary, Jeremy Hunt, is still in a job) and, with trials still pending against some of Murdoch’s most loathsome minions, left me hoping that future reprints of the book will include a coda detailing yet more revelations and humblings… RM