The Spiders of Allah

"This may sound a bit like special pleading, but there is occasionally a bit of sniffiness about reporters writing books about their time in a war zone. People think, “Oh it’s just another journo’s memoirs.” But in Hider’s case, and certainly in the case of Iraq generally, it’s true to say that, in terms of providing a westerner’s perspective, journalists were among the very few people who saw what was going on in Iraq from all sides. If you were with the military or the civilian administration you weren’t really allowed out of the Green Zones to see things for yourself. This was because of security concerns – it wasn’t that others weren’t prepared to take those risks. It’s just the way it was. So by talking to people from all walks of life and chronicling what was going on, I think Hider has done a very good job. He brings a whole country to life. “In terms of providing a westerner’s perspective, journalists were among the very few people who saw what was going on in Iraq from all sides.” And, more importantly, it’s written in a very entertaining style and it’s very readable. A mistake that a lot of journalists make when writing a book is that they simply chronicle what’s going on without paying sufficient attention to whether it’s readable or not, and they end up with something that reads like an academic text. Which is fine, but it might not encourage a lot of people to read it."