This memoir is subtitled My Life in Intrigue, and it certainly is, but so much more besides.
I have a friend who was telling me that she read The Day of the Jackal when she was a teenager, and has never forgotten it. She remembers thinking, ‘Now that’s how to write a book that can’t be put down.’
I feel the same, and even more so about The Odessa File, and then there’s…
Well, I won’t go on, but there has never been a dud from this author.
So, what about this memoir? In a nutshell it’s fascinating, fluent, unputdownable. Frederick Forsyth is Words for the Wounded’s LitFest Day’s guest speaker on March 25th and I will ask him if he writes as easily and fluently as his books read. I fear he will say yes, and that he only writes one draft. After which I will go outside and scream, because I sweat over at least two drafts.
The Outsider is so funny, exciting and utterly fascinating. What’s more, it is a life that didn’t just come to Forsyth, it is one he made happen.
This man wanted to fly, so he entered the RAF as their youngest pilot ever, at seventeen and a half, during National Service. I won’t tell you how. Read the book.
He didn’t want, ultimately, to be a desk pilot, so left to become what he did want: a journalist, in particular a foreign correspondent. This he achieved, of course. It is during this career that he found the grist for his mill when it became time to write his novels.
Never a yes man, always an outsider… I now know about Forsyth being a pilot, and by crikey, this bloke flew through his life by the seat of his pants on an absolute roller-coaster. He escaped disaster by the skin of his teeth, met crazy and/or inspiring characters, witnessed things better not seen, and went back for more.
You must read The Outsider. Amusing (if you don’t laugh out loud at the ‘nannies bearing talcum powder’ then I despair). You will be in awe at his self-confidence, and be moved at the clear emotional bond between Forsyth and his parents, fascinated by the worlds in which he found himself. No wonder his novels are so ‘real’, so breathlessly exciting.
Start with The Outsider, then work your way through the novels – again if you have already read them. It’s no wonder they’re the benchmark for today’s writers.
The Outsider – My life in Intrigue by Frederick Forsyth Corgi pb £8.99
WforW LitFest Day 25th March: Guest Speaker Frederick Forsyth. Fabulous line up. Downley, near London. Tickets and details: www.wordsforthewounded.co.uk