The Traitors, Josh Ireland
The Traitors, Josh Ireland
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The Traitors
A True Story of Blood, Betrayal and Deceit

Author: Josh Ireland

Narrator: Gareth Armstrong

Unabridged: 8 hr 4 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: John Murray

Published: 07/20/2017


Synopsis

'An epic tale of love, dishonour, bravery, cowardice, betrayal and high-treason. Beautifully written. A stunning debut' Damien Lewis

Playboy. Fascist. Strongman. Thief.
Traitors.

September 1939. For years now Britain has been rudderless, divided and grievously unequal. Successive governments have floundered as they struggled to cope with economic misery at home and machinations abroad. Many of the country's citizens are seduced by fascism; others are simply left alienated by leaders who seem unwilling or unable to take the decisive action that is so desperately needed.

When war breaks out the imperiled nation achieves the unity and purpose that has eluded it for more than a decade. It is a time of heroism and sacrifice in which many thousands of soldiers and civilians give their lives. But some Britons choose a different path, renegades who will fight for the Third Reich until its gruesome collapse in 1945. The Traitors tells the stories of four such men: the chaotic, tragic John Amery; the idealistic but hate-filled William Joyce; the cynical, murderous conman Harold Cole; and Eric Pleasants, an iron-willed pacifist and bodybuilder who wants no part in this war.

Drawing on declassified MI5 files, as well as diaries, letters and memoirs, The Traitors is a book about disordered lives in turbulent times; idealism twisted out of shape; of torn consciences and abandoned loyalties; of murder, deceit, temptation and loss. It shows how a man might come to desert his country's cause, and the tragic consequences that treachery brings in its wake.

(P)2017 John Murray Press

About Josh Ireland

Josh Ireland is a writer and editor. He lives in London and is the author of The Traitors (2017), an Observer book of the year, and Churchill & Son (2021), a Daily Telegraph book of the year. He has also ghosted a number of top-five Sunday Times bestsellers and written for the Daily Telegraph, Prospect, Spectator and the Times Literary Supplement.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Krepde

A fresh way of approaching four interesting subjects. Ireland turns the magnifying glass on the behaviour of four traitors of the Second World War. Well researched, the author opts for the present tense. That gives the stories an immediacy but at the expense of a sense of historical objectivity. Elo......more

Goodreads review by George

Follows 4 Brits (or pretend British) through World War 2. These Brits decided to join the other side or sit it out. The challenge here is to make one book out of 4 story lines that almost never intersect. Each of these four are interesting in their own way — war makes strange bedfellows. At times th......more


Quotes

In this clever, racy book [Josh Ireland] tells the stories of four British citizens who served Nazi Germany . . . full of energy and stylish phrase-making The Times

An epic tale of love, dishonour, bravery, cowardice, betrayal and high-treason. Beautifully written. A stunning debut Damien Lewis

A terrific read that is lucid, insightful and beautifully written. Josh Ireland's masterful prose breathes life into these complex, deceitful, yet profoundly fascinating traitors. Set against a backdrop of violent extremism and political failure, The Traitors rings a loud warning bell from history Giles Milton

Josh Ireland's achievement is to tell the story of some of Britain's most inglorious, notorious and vainglorous characters in the most glorious and elegant way. He provides a warning for our times from this true story, painting the most vivid of pictures with the sharpest of novelist's pens John Bew

Ireland gives a vivid account of this repellent, but fascinating, quartet Daily Mail

[Ireland] comments intelligently on their motives and describes enough of their worlds and views to give us essential context The Spectator

Ireland's book gives a good flavour of the personality defects that caused men to betray their country . . . Ireland tells their stories entertainingly, and examines their motives without prejudice Daily Telegraph

Startlingly vivid . . . unmistakably a book of our times Prospect Magazine

Absorbing . . . Josh Ireland organises this testament of treachery with vim and purpose . . . he skewers his subjects with a piercing revulsion Mail on Sunday

A well-written and very readable account of these four unappealing characters . . . this is a tough subject to get to grips with. Ireland's book is a very worthy effort Literary Review