|
Charles Cumming
Charles Cumming (born 1971) is a British writer of spy fiction. Early life and education Cumming was born in 1971, in Ayr, Scotland, the son of Ian Cumming (b. 1938) and Caroline Pilkington (b. 1943). He was educated at Ludgrove School (1979–1984), Eton College (1985–1989) and the University of Edinburgh (1990–1994), where he earned a first class honours degree in English Literature. In 1995, Cumming was approached for recruitment by the United Kingdom's Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) but did not go on to work for them. Career Cumming's first novel, ''A Spy by Nature'', was published in the UK in June 2001. The novel's hero, Alec Milius, is a flawed loner in his early 20s who is instructed by MI5 to sell doctored research data on oil exploration in the Caspian Sea to the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). In August 2001, Cumming moved to Madrid. His second novel, ''The Hidden Man'' (2003), tells the story of two brothers investigating the murder of their father, a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Eton College
Eton College () is a public school in Eton, Berkshire, England. It was founded in 1440 by Henry VI under the name ''Kynge's College of Our Ladye of Eton besyde Windesore'',Nevill, p. 3 ff. intended as a sister institution to King's College, Cambridge, making it the 18th-oldest Headmasters' and Headmistresses' Conference (HMC) school. Eton is particularly well-known for its history, wealth, and notable alumni, called Old Etonians. Eton is one of only three public schools, along with Harrow (1572) and Radley (1847), to have retained the boys-only, boarding-only tradition, which means that its boys live at the school seven days a week. The remainder (such as Rugby in 1976, Charterhouse in 1971, Westminster in 1973, and Shrewsbury in 2015) have since become co-educational or, in the case of Winchester, as of 2021 are undergoing the transition to that status. Eton has educated prime ministers, world leaders, Nobel laureates, Academy Award and BAFTA award-winning actors, and ge ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
2008 Summer Olympics
The 2008 Summer Olympics (), officially the Games of the XXIX Olympiad () and also known as Beijing 2008 (), were an international multisport event held from 8 to 24 August 2008, in Beijing, China. A total of 10,942 athletes from 204 National Olympic Committees (NOCs) competed in 28 sports and 302 events, one event more than those scheduled for the 2004 Summer Olympics. This was the first time China had hosted the Olympic Games, and the third time the Summer Olympic Games had been held in East Asia, following the 1964 Olympics in Tokyo, Japan, and the 1988 Olympics in Seoul, South Korea. These were also the second Summer Olympic Games to be held in a communist state, the first being the 1980 Summer Olympics in the Soviet Union (with venues in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, and Estonia). Beijing was awarded the 2008 Games over four competitors on 13 July 2001, having won a majority of votes from members of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) after two rounds o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
HarperCollins
HarperCollins Publishers LLC is one of the Big Five English-language publishing companies, alongside Penguin Random House, Simon & Schuster, Hachette, and Macmillan. The company is headquartered in New York City and is a subsidiary of News Corp. The name is a combination of several publishing firm names: Harper & Row, an American publishing company acquired in 1987—whose own name was the result of an earlier merger of Harper & Brothers (founded in 1817) and Row, Peterson & Company—together with Scottish publishing company William Collins, Sons (founded in 1819), acquired in 1989. The worldwide CEO of HarperCollins is Brian Murray. HarperCollins has publishing groups in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, Brazil, India, and China. The company publishes many different imprints, both former independent publishing houses and new imprints. History Collins Harper Mergers and acquisitions Collins was bought by Rupert Murdoch's News Corpora ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Federal Security Service
The Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation (FSB) RF; rus, Федеральная служба безопасности Российской Федерации (ФСБ России), Federal'naya sluzhba bezopasnosti Rossiyskoy Federatsii, fʲɪdʲɪˈralʲnəjə ˈsluʐbə bʲɪzɐˈpasnəstʲɪ rɐˈsʲijskəj fʲɪdʲɪˈratsɨɪ) is the principal security agency of Russia and the main successor agency to the Soviet Union's KGB; its immediate predecessor was the Federal Counterintelligence Service (FSK) which was reorganized into the FSB in 1995. The three major structural successor components of the former KGB that remain administratively independent of the FSB are the Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR), the Federal Protective Service (FSO), and the Main Directorate of Special Programs of the President of the Russian Federation (GUSP). The primary responsibilities are within the country and include counter-intelligence, internal and border security, counter-terr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Voronezh
Voronezh ( rus, links=no, Воро́неж, p=vɐˈronʲɪʂ}) is a city and the administrative centre of Voronezh Oblast in southwestern Russia straddling the Voronezh River, located from where it flows into the Don River. The city sits on the Southeastern Railway, which connects western Russia with the Urals and Siberia, the Caucasus and Ukraine, and the M4 highway (Moscow–Voronezh–Rostov-on-Don– Novorossiysk). In recent years the city has experienced rapid population growth, rising in 2021 to 1,057,681, up from 889,680 recorded in the 2010 Census; making it the fourteenth most populous city in the country. Geography Urban layout Information about the original urban layout of Voronezh is contained in the "Patrol Book" of 1615. At that time, the city fortress was logged and located on the banks of the Voronezh River. In plan, it was an irregular quadrangle with a perimeter of about 130 fathoms (238 m), that is, it was very small: inside it, due to lack of space, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger
The CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger is an annual award given by the British Crime Writers' Association for best thriller of the year. The award is sponsored by the estate of Ian Fleming. It is given to a title that fits the broadest definition of the thriller novel; these can be set in any period and include, but are not limited to, spy fiction and/or action/ adventure stories. Ian Fleming said there was one essential criterion for a good thriller – that “one simply has to turn the pages”; this is one of the main characteristics that the judges will be looking for. Winners 2020s ;2021 *Winner: Michael Robotham, ''When She Was Good'' ** Robert Galbraith, ''Troubled Blood'' ** Catherine Ryan Howard, ''The Nothing Man'' ** Stuart Turton, ''The Devil and the Dark Water'' ** Ruth Ware, ''One by One'' ** Chris Whitaker, ''We Begin at the End'' ;2020 * Winner: Lou Berney, ''November Road'' ** Tom Chatfield, ''This is Gomorrah{{Cite web, last=, first=, date=, title=The Ian Flemin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Scottish Crime Book Of The Year
Bloody Scotland is a Scottish international crime writing festival, held annually in Stirling, Scotland. It was founded in 2012 by Tartan Noir writers Lin Anderson and Alex Gray and describes itself as "the literary festival where you can let down your hair and enjoy a drink at the bar with your favourite crime writer". Its sponsors include the University of Stirling and Stirling Council. In 2022 most events were held at the Albert Halls or the Tolbooth. The festival awards The McIlvanney Prize for "the best Scottish Crime book of the year" (so named in 2016 for writer William McIlvanney (1936-2015), who has been called "the Godfather of Tartan Noir"), and, since 2019, the Bloody Scotland Scottish Crime Debut of the Year. McIlvanney Prize winners * 2012: Charles Cumming, ''A Foreign Country'' * 2013: Malcolm Mackay, ''How A Gunman Says Goodbye'' * 2014: Peter May, ''Entry Island'' * 2015: Craig Russell, ''The Ghosts of Altona'' * 2016: Chris Brookmyre, ''Black Widow'' * 2 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Washington Post
''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large national audience. Daily broadsheet editions are printed for D.C., Maryland, and Virginia. The ''Post'' was founded in 1877. In its early years, it went through several owners and struggled both financially and editorially. Financier Eugene Meyer purchased it out of bankruptcy in 1933 and revived its health and reputation, work continued by his successors Katharine and Phil Graham (Meyer's daughter and son-in-law), who bought out several rival publications. The ''Post'' 1971 printing of the Pentagon Papers helped spur opposition to the Vietnam War. Subsequently, in the best-known episode in the newspaper's history, reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein led the American press's investigation into what became known as the Watergate scandal ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cambridge Spies
''Cambridge Spies'' is a four-part British drama miniseries written by Peter Moffat and directed by Tim Fywell, that was first broadcast on BBC Two in May 2003 and is based on the true story of four brilliant young men at the University of Cambridge who are recruited to spy for the Soviet Union in 1934. Plot The series is set from 1934 to 1951 and follows the lives of the best-known quartet of the Cambridge Five Soviet spies, Guy Burgess, Kim Philby, Anthony Blunt and Donald Maclean, who whilst studying at the University of Cambridge are courted by Soviet agents and recruited into a world of covert intelligence and espionage. Fueled by youthful idealism, a passion for social justice, a talent for lying and a hatred for fascism, the four take huge personal risks to pass Britain's biggest secrets to Moscow. Across almost twenty years of spying and treachery, the four are bound by their beliefs, the secrets they know about one another, and the knowledge that they stand or fall tog ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Trinity Six
''The Trinity Six'' is a 2011 thriller novel by Charles Cumming. Plot summary Sam Gaddis is a history professor at University College London. His friend Charlotte Berg tells him she is writing a book about the "Sixth Man", a sixth member of the Cambridge Five Russian spy ring. However, Charlotte dies of a heart attack the next day. Unbeknownst to Gaddis, she was murdered by a Russian agent using sodium fluoracetate. Gaddis decides to finish her book, in order to pay off his debts. His lover Holly Levette gives him her mother Katya's files, who was researching a book about the KGB. Gaddis contacts an elderly man called Thomas Neame, who knew the sixth man Edward Crane. He discovers that Crane was really a double agent who worked for the British, and Crane's death was faked by MI6 to protect him, on the instructions of John Brennan, who later became the head of MI6. Gaddis later discovers that Neame is Crane. The medical staff who helped fake Crane's death are murdered by the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid digital subscribers. It also is a producer of popular podcasts such as '' The Daily''. Founded in 1851 by Henry Jarvis Raymond and George Jones, it was initially published by Raymond, Jones & Company. The ''Times'' has won 132 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any newspaper, and has long been regarded as a national " newspaper of record". For print it is ranked 18th in the world by circulation and 3rd in the U.S. The paper is owned by the New York Times Company, which is publicly traded. It has been governed by the Sulzberger family since 1896, through a dual-class share structure after its shares became publicly traded. A. G. Sulzberger, the paper's publisher and the company's chairman, is the fifth generation of the family to head the pa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Boyd (writer)
William Andrew Murray Boyd (born 7 March 1952) is a Scottish novelist, short story writer and screenwriter. Biography Boyd was born in Accra, Gold Coast, (present-day Ghana), to Scottish parents, both from Fife, and has two younger sisters. His father Alexander, a doctor specialising in tropical medicine, and Boyd's mother, who was a teacher, moved to the Gold Coast in 1950 to run the health clinic at the University College of the Gold Coast, Legon (now the University of Ghana). In the early 1960s the family moved to western Nigeria, where Boyd's father held a similar position at the University of Ibadan. Boyd spent his early life in Ghana and Nigeria and, at the age of nine, went to a preparatory school and then to Gordonstoun school in Scotland, and, after that, to the University of Nice in France, followed by the University of Glasgow, where he gained an M.A. (Hons) in English & Philosophy, and finally Jesus College, Oxford. His father died of a rare disease when Boyd was ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
.jpg "Click for more on -> Voronezh")
.png "Click for more on -> The New York Times")