Bourne's Identity

For a while now I have seen books in the library by an author called Sam Bourne.  To me it always cried out as the type of books which I occasionally read, and mostly enjoy, but somehow feel that I should be reading something meatier.  This sounds rather pompous I know, but it’s not meant to be.  It’s more the fact that a lot of those books are in fact very bad, and by reading them it almost feels as if you are giving credence to the bad book industry.

Anyway, I recently found out, after listening to Radio 2’s Drivetime show, that Sam Bourne is in fact Jonathan Freedland.  Being a well know journalist in his own right, his agent and publishers had decided that his thriller writing should come out in another name because they were worried that the target audience for the books would be put off by seeing Freedland’s name on the cover.

Ironically this was the reason why I had not previously read any of his books, but quickly rushed out to get one from the library after I had found out the truth; yes, perhaps I am a bit snobbish after all, and certainly odd.

The book I have just read is called The Chosen One, not his latest, and not his first either.  It sits somewhere in the middle.  But still, it is very good.  It starts off with a brand new hope of a President (where have we heard that before?) having recently taken office, but then two bombshells about him are broken within two days...a third is posited.  The person leaking this information is then found dead and the whole country is asking: Was he silenced by the President?

The book is exciting and definitely a page turner (I read it in just over a day), but also poses some intriguing questions. I won’t give them away here since that would ruin the story, but take it from me that as well as being a thriller it does have a meatier content.  And I will definitely be looking out for more Sam Bourne books in future.