Hello

I’m a journalist and author, writing about politics, history, spies, films and anything else that interests me. In particular, I write Parliamentary sketches for The Critic magazine, and co-host the war movies show A Pod Too Far.

Would you like me to come and speak at your corporate event, literary festival, university faculty or something else? I know an awful lot about elections, how journalism works, and secret wartime intelligence. Go here to find out how to get in touch.

You can sign up here to get an email every time a new sketch is published:

My book on Journalese, Romps, Tots and Boffins, was a lot of people’s Book of the Year. My last book, Agent Jack, described in detail for the first time a previously unknown MI5 operation to catch British fascists during World War 2. I’m currently working on another book about the intelligence war.

Between 2004 and 2020, I led Bloomberg’s British political coverage, taking in a surprisingly large number of elections and referendums. I spent a lot of time on planes, generally about 50 feet behind whoever was prime minister that week. If I wasn’t doing that, I was watching votes in the House of Commons. It was a way to make a living, and it’s left me with a very particular set of skills: I know the best way to sneak into the Oval Office when the president’s officials say there’s no room, and can direct you to good bars close to government buildings on five continents. I did also, to my lasting pride, invent the “Classic Dom” meme. Sorry everyone (except Dom).

Read some of my journalism, watch me talk about my books, or get in touch.

In 2022, I was shortlisted for Comment Journalist of the Year in the British Journalism Awards, Columnist of the Year in the British Society of Magazine Editors Awards and Writer of the Year in the Independent Publisher Awards.

My Bookshop.org page has some lists of books I’ve particularly enjoyed, or recommend for research, if you like that kind of thing.