Photo: Marc Femenia / TT (2008)
Sample of authors
Follett, Ken
British author and journalist born in Cardiff, Wales. Kenneth "Ken" Follett’s parents were active members of the church of the Plymouth Brethren, and as a child he was not allowed to watch television. Instead he read profusely; his first favourite author was Shakespeare. Follett graduated from University College London in 1970 and began to write about rock music for the Cardiff-based South Wales E...
Literary figures
Boysie (Brian) Oakes
Gender: Male
He is recruited as a spy by mistake, and is regarded as tough, ruthless and bloodthirsty. In actual fact, he is an easy-going, forgetful and cowardly mummy’s boy, who hires gangsters to carry out the acts of violence he is ordered to do. This doesn’t prevent Brian ‘Boysie’ Oakes from making a career. It is simplest to describe him as a parody of James Bond, and John Gardner has written a suite of...