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James Hider

Goodreads Author

Born

London

Twitter

jimbohider

Member Since

May 2013

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I have always been fascinated by what you might call the pathology of ideas -- how they mutate as different societies inherit, steal or are infected by foreign concepts, customs and gods. How a Disney character can become an icon of Islamist martyrdom, how we invent gods because we are afraid of dying, then end up dying for these invented gods. Having seen at first hand, and all too often, the most extreme results of these ever-warping ideas, I sat down and tried to write about them in "Spiders of Allah," the result of seven years covering conflict across the Middle East. Because the history of the region stretches back so far, the ideas that have come out of it have had millennia to warp and twist. You can see front lines that date back th ...more

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James Hider’s books

Average rating: 4.07 · 1,918 ratings · 195 reviews · 3 distinct works • Similar authors

	Ripe 4.08 avg rating — 1,591 ratings — 4 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Spiders of Allah: Travels of an Unbeliever on the Frontline of Holy War 3.84 avg rating — 179 ratings — published 2009 — 11 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Cronix 4.19 avg rating — 160 ratings — published 2014 — 4 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

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James Hider's Blog

ethical dilemma

I had a piece of shrapnel go straight through my left arm during one of the many, endless battles for Fallujah a decade ago. The wound left almost no scar tissue at all. Three months ago, a vicious but very small bee stung me on almost exactly the same spot on my��right arm, and there’s still a big red mark there. So should I tweak the truth and present the bee sting as the battle scar when dronin

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James’s Recent Updates

James Hider is now friends with Robbie Sheerin
Jun 03, 2025 11:36AM · like
James Hider rated a book it was ok Piranesi by Susanna Clarke	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
This felt like reading a description of someone playing Sudoku, or doing a crossword puzzle: probably fun for them, but very dull for the observer. Not sure where the endless descriptions of someone wandering around empty halls was going, but it took ...more
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