Editions

In Extremis

  • Imprint: Chatto & Windus

  • ISBN: 9781784740931

  • Length: 416  Pages

  • Dimensions: 240mm x 38mm x 162mm

  • Weight: 681g

  • RRP: £20.00

In Extremis

  • The Life of War Correspondent Marie Colvin

** BBC RADIO 4 BOOK OF THE WEEK **
** A SUNDAY TIMES BOOK OF THE YEAR **
**Marie Colvin is the subject of a major biopic starring Rosamund Pike**

'A stunningly good biography' WILLIAM BOYD

Marie Colvin was glamorous, hard-drinking, braver than the boys, with a troubled and rackety personal life. She reported from the most dangerous places in the world, going in further and staying longer than anyone else. Like her hero, the legendary reporter Martha Gellhorn, she sought to bear witness to the horrifying truths of war, to write ‘the first draft of history’ and to shine a light on the suffering of ordinary people.

Marie covered the major conflicts of our time: Israel and Palestine, Chechnya, East Timor, Sri Lanka – where she was hit by a grenade and lost sight in her left eye, resulting in her trademark eye-patch – Iraq and Afghanistan. Her anecdotes about encounters with dictators and presidents – including Colonel Gaddafi and Yasser Arafat, whom she knew well – were incomparable. She was much admired, and as famous for her wild parties as for the extraordinary lengths to which she went to tell the story, including being smuggled into Syria where she was killed in 2012.

Written by fellow foreign correspondent Lindsey Hilsum, this is the story of the most daring war reporter of her time. Drawing on unpublished diaries and interviews with Marie's friends, family and colleagues, Hilsum conjures a fiercely compassionate, complex woman who was driven to an extraordinary life and tragic death. In Extremis is the story of our turbulent age, and the life of a woman who defied convention.

*Marie Colvin is remembered in two films: Under the Wire, a drama-doc about Marie’s last trip to Syria, and A Private War, a feature film about her life, starring Rosamund Pike*

  • Imprint: Chatto & Windus

  • ISBN: 9781784740931

  • Length: 416  Pages

  • Dimensions: 240mm x 38mm x 162mm

  • Weight: 681g

  • RRP: £20.00

Reviews

  • "An extraordinary account of one reporter's fearless and ultimately fatal dedication... Hilsum draws an empathetic portrait of a woman whose courage often crossed into recklessness, both in combat zones and outside them... Now, thanks to Hilsum's deeply reported and passionately written book, Colvin has the full accounting that she deserves"

    New York Times

  • "A wonderful book – a fitting tribute, certainly, but also a well-told tale of a remarkable life"

    Sunday Times

  • "Hilsum marshals not just empathy for her subject, who was also a friend, but investigative and critical skills and damn fine storytelling... Hilsum's understanding of the background to each conflict, and the reality of life as a correspondent in the field, is one of the great strengths of the book... In Extremis rescues Marie Colvin from the rubble of Baba Amr, and brings her tragically, and tenderly, to life"

    Irish Times

  • "The clearest and most rounded picture...emerges from Hilsum's book. Colvin herself, courageous and often tortured, rises again from its pages"

    Observer

  • "Marie Colvin was a one-off, eccentric, brilliant and sometimes maddening. Lindsey Hilsum does her justice"

    Evening Standard

  • "Colvin’s energy and passion were irresistible… Hilsum…[combines] storytelling with asking important questions about what kind of service war correspondents perform and what ethical codes they should adhere to"

    Guardian

  • "One of the best biographies I have read about any journalist... This is a great story, well told... What makes the biography and the life on which it is based so impressive is the truly heroic proportions of Colvin's dedication to getting the story of human beings trapped in war"

    The Intercept

  • "In Extremis seeks to unravel the mystery behind the war correspondent... Hilsum avoids hagiography...and pulls no punches"

    The Times

  • "Hilsum crafts a full and rich portrait of Colvin that never becomes hagiography. In Extremis is an intensely human account that does justice to its subject"

    Irish independent

  • "In writing this richly researched and well-crafted account, Hilsum avoids canonising Saint Marie of Fleet Street... That it fell to someone else to do the reporting on her remarkable life story may seem tragic. It is also, perhaps, a measure of just who she was"

    Spectator

About the Author

Lindsey Hilsum

Lindsey Hilsum is Channel 4 News International Editor. She has covered many of the conflicts of recent years, including Syria, Ukraine and the Arab Spring – sometimes alongside Marie Colvin. In 1994, she was the only English-speaking foreign correspondent in Rwanda when the genocide began. She was in Belgrade for the 1999 NATO bombing of Serbia, and in Baghdad for the 2003 US invasion of Iraq. She has won awards from the Royal Television Society and BAFTA amongst others, and was the recipient of the 2017 Patron’s Medal from the Royal Geographical Society. Her last book Sandstorm: Libya from Gadaffi to Revolution was described by the Observer as ‘an account with historical depth to match dramatic reportage.’

Lindsey Hilsum

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