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Trail of Havoc: In the Steps of Lord Lucan
ARISTOCRATS & MURDER
240 pages, Mass Market Paperback
Published June 1, 1989
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
January 26, 2012
This is an okay book. Except that it's not about Lord Lucan, the infamous British nobleman who disappeared on the night, in 1974, when he allegedly murdered his children's nanny and tried to kill his wife.
This book is, mostly, about a protracted legal battle the author and fellow members of a British muckraking newspaper, PRIVATE EYE, fought against one Sir James Goldsmith, a lawsuit-happy nobleman who tried to radically alter the UK's freedom of speech laws to benefit himself and his cronies. The book is also about how many of these lords and ladies, some of whom were high-ranking UK government officials, may or may not have been crooks and/or Communist spies. The very slim thread tying everything together here is that a couple of these folks were friends of Lord Lucan's.
Now, I'm not saying that freedom of speech and government corruption aren't important topics. They certainly are. The problem is, though, that unless you're interested in these topics, you'll find yourself propping your eyelids open with your fingers as you slog through Mr. Marnham's book. This is also a very British book; unless you happen to hail from the UK, some of the references will mystify you. (I didn't know, for example, that a 'saloon' is British English for a sedan.) So be sure to have Google handy.
As for those of us who are interested in Lord Lucan? We are, for the most part, left wanting. Marnham leaves Lucan on page 75 and doesn't pick him up again until almost 100 pages later. At the tail-end of his manuscript, Marnham makes some intriguing speculations about what really happened on that blood-spattered evening 38 years ago. But he stops short of venturing a single guess on what happened to Unlucky Lucan after he drove off into the night, never to be heard from again. The book doesn't end so much as it just stops, in a slam-bang fashion. Most unsatisfactory guv'ner, as they might say in old London Town.
So if you want to read about Lord Lucan, try Wikipedia. You'll learn more there than you will from this rather disjointed hodgepodge.
This book is, mostly, about a protracted legal battle the author and fellow members of a British muckraking newspaper, PRIVATE EYE, fought against one Sir James Goldsmith, a lawsuit-happy nobleman who tried to radically alter the UK's freedom of speech laws to benefit himself and his cronies. The book is also about how many of these lords and ladies, some of whom were high-ranking UK government officials, may or may not have been crooks and/or Communist spies. The very slim thread tying everything together here is that a couple of these folks were friends of Lord Lucan's.
Now, I'm not saying that freedom of speech and government corruption aren't important topics. They certainly are. The problem is, though, that unless you're interested in these topics, you'll find yourself propping your eyelids open with your fingers as you slog through Mr. Marnham's book. This is also a very British book; unless you happen to hail from the UK, some of the references will mystify you. (I didn't know, for example, that a 'saloon' is British English for a sedan.) So be sure to have Google handy.
As for those of us who are interested in Lord Lucan? We are, for the most part, left wanting. Marnham leaves Lucan on page 75 and doesn't pick him up again until almost 100 pages later. At the tail-end of his manuscript, Marnham makes some intriguing speculations about what really happened on that blood-spattered evening 38 years ago. But he stops short of venturing a single guess on what happened to Unlucky Lucan after he drove off into the night, never to be heard from again. The book doesn't end so much as it just stops, in a slam-bang fashion. Most unsatisfactory guv'ner, as they might say in old London Town.
So if you want to read about Lord Lucan, try Wikipedia. You'll learn more there than you will from this rather disjointed hodgepodge.
January 11, 2023
Finally read this irresistably-titled book after getting it as a gift. Wonderfully written and gave me all kinds of food for thought on the Lucan case. The theories in here might even be correct -- they do fit the available facts very well. I did come away wishing for more information on Mrs. Rivett, because the author did not rule out the possibility that she was not after all killed by mistake. After reading every word of this book I do not understand the long, convoluted detour into British libel law. Did it have any bearing on this case, or did the author include it because so many acquaintances of Lord Lucan were tied into it? One more question to scratch my head about I guess, in a genuine head-scratcher of a crime.
October 5, 2013
I have always been interested in 'true crime' and the case of Lord Lucan. I found Patrick Marnham's style of writing very easy to read and in fact I read this book in one sitting of about 2 1/2 hours. I have noticed that some reviewers criticize the book for its degree of content on the libel cases brought against Private Eye in relation to its reporting of the Lucan case. I actually thought that their inclusion was very interesting in terms of giving an overall picture of the case. In relation to the events of 7 November 1974, at the end of the book Patrick Marnham sets out his own theories about what happened that fateful night and they are certainly thought-provoking to say the least.
April 19, 2019
I enjoyed the parts of this book which actually involved the story of Lord Lucan. Unfortunately those parts were only Part 1 and the conclusion, with the approximately 100 pages in between discussing the lawsuit one of Lucan's friends brought against a magazine for libel. Being unfamiliar with the British legal system, those pages were hard to get through.
In all, I would reccommend only reading Part 1 and the conclusion if you're interested in Lord Lucan, and simply skipping over the entire middle section.
In all, I would reccommend only reading Part 1 and the conclusion if you're interested in Lord Lucan, and simply skipping over the entire middle section.
March 15, 2024
an impulse buy from a bargain bin abroad, i assumed this was going to be a tale of the Lucan murder and disappearing act, facts of which i had only a passing awareness off ... oddly enough this turned out not to be strictly true, as the author, having taken up the baton of the story, then continues with it and uses that baton as a stick to bask Jimmy Goldsmith with ...
This, it turned out, was hardly surprising, as the author, turned out to be an editor of Private Eye magazine during the years when Goldsmith had tried to bankrupt them through the libel courts and so, the tenuous link to Lucan was very much relied on ... Goldsmith had been reported in the Eye to have attended a post Lucan disappearance dinner, where members of Lucan's circle discussed helping him if he reached out ... this story, first printed in the national papers turned out to be false, and this was the stick used to bash the Eye thru the courts with ...
Lucan's story bookends this battle in the book, and are touched on lightly, the general gist of it being he came from a line of overly entitled idiots, enjoyed the companionship of similar types, and was himself true to that form ... The author lays out a theory of the events of the night Sandra Rivett was murdered, and his Lucan's wife assaulted, and offers a line or two about when happened after, but the crux of this book is his antipathy towards Goldsmith and the threads of that story.
This, it turned out, was hardly surprising, as the author, turned out to be an editor of Private Eye magazine during the years when Goldsmith had tried to bankrupt them through the libel courts and so, the tenuous link to Lucan was very much relied on ... Goldsmith had been reported in the Eye to have attended a post Lucan disappearance dinner, where members of Lucan's circle discussed helping him if he reached out ... this story, first printed in the national papers turned out to be false, and this was the stick used to bash the Eye thru the courts with ...
Lucan's story bookends this battle in the book, and are touched on lightly, the general gist of it being he came from a line of overly entitled idiots, enjoyed the companionship of similar types, and was himself true to that form ... The author lays out a theory of the events of the night Sandra Rivett was murdered, and his Lucan's wife assaulted, and offers a line or two about when happened after, but the crux of this book is his antipathy towards Goldsmith and the threads of that story.
April 12, 2010
Lord Lucan and the murder of his nanny continues to be very fascinating as to this day we still don't know what happened back in the 1970's and where he ended up.....maybe one day it will all be revealed for sure.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews