Fergal Keane

A journalist who covered the one-hundred-day Rwandan war in 1994 provides a disturbing account that suggests that a power-hungry group, using hate radio and local political leaders as brainwashers, purposely incited thousands of Hutus to kill minority Tutsis

A Rwandan Journey

Season of Blood

Winner of the British Army Military Book of the Year 2011 The story of one of the most brutal battles in modern history - fought at a major turning point of the Second World War. Kohima. In this remote Indian village near the border with Burma, a tiny force of British and Indian troops faced the might of the Imperial Japanese Army. Outnumbered ten to one, the defenders fought the Japanese hand to hand in a battle that was amongst the most savage in modern warfare. A garrison of no more than 1,500 fighting men, desperately short of water and with the wounded compelled to lie in the open, faced a force of 15,000 Japanese. They held the pass and prevented a Japanese victory that would have proved disastrous for the British. Another six weeks of bitter fighting followed as British and Indian reinforcements strove to drive the enemy out of India. When the battle was over, a Japanese army that had invaded India on a mission of imperial conquest had suffered the worst defeat in its history. Thousands of men lay dead on a devastated landscape, while tens of thousands more Japanese starved in a catastrophic retreat eastwards. They called the journey back to Burma the 'Road of Bones', as friends and comrades committed suicide or dropped dead from hunger along the jungle paths. Fergal Keane has reported for the BBC from conflicts on every continent over the past 25 years, and he brings to this work of history not only rigorous scholarship but a raw understanding of the pitiless nature of war. It is a story filled with vivid characters: the millionaire's son who refused a commission and was awarded a VC for his sacrifice in battle, the Roedean debutante who led a guerrilla band in the jungle, and the General who defied the orders of a hated superior in order to save the lives of his men. Based on original research in Japan, Britain and India, 'Road of Bones' is a story about extraordinary courage and the folly of imperial dreams.

The Epic Siege of Kohima 1944

Road of Bones

In a memoir of staggering power and candour, award-winning journalist Fergal Keane addresses his experience of wars of different kinds, some very public and others acutely personal.

All of These People: A Memoir

Fergal Keane is the BBC's best known foreign correspondent. This collection of his work includes articles written in South Africa Cambodia, Rwanda, Sri Lanka and Japan. It also contains the widely known and emotive work, "Letter to Daniel".

Despatches from the Heart

Letter to Daniel

This book provides historical and political analysis of the ending of apartheid in South Africa, although it is primarily about the experience of ordinary South Africans as they feel the heave of history propel them towards a new uncharted country.

A Journey Through the Last White Empire

The Bondage of Fear

A family story of a murder, blood and betrayal that tore an Irish town apart and causes men to be silent still. After nearly three decades reporting conflict from all over the world for the BBC, Fergal Keane has gone home to Ireland to tell a story that lies at the root of his fascination with war. It is a family story of war and love, and how the ghosts of the past return to shape the present. Wounds is a powerful memoir about Irish people who found themselves caught up in the revolution that followed the 1916 Rising, and in the pitiless violence of civil war in north Kerry after the British left in 1922. It is the story of Keane's grandmother Hanna Purtill, her brother Mick and his friend Con Brosnan, and how they and their neighbours took up guns to fight the British Empire and create an independent Ireland. And it is the story of another Irishman, Tobias O'Sullivan, who fought against them as a policeman because he believed it was his duty to uphold the law of his country. Many thousands of people took part in the War of Independence and the Civil War that followed. Whatever side they chose, all were changed in some way by the costs of violence. Keane uses the experiences of his ancestral homeland in north Kerry to examine why people will kill for a cause and how the act of killing reverberates through the generations.

A Memoir of War and Love

Wounds

When President Habyarimana’s jet was shot down in April 1994, Rwanda erupted into a hundred-day orgy of killing – which left up to a million dead. Fergal Keane travelled through the country as the genocide was continuing, and his powerful analysis reveals the terrible truth behind the headlines. ‘A tender, angry account ... As well as being a scathing indictment – Keane says the genocide inflicted on the Tutsis was planned well in advance by Hutu leaders – this is a graphic view of news-gathering in extremis. It deserves to become a classic’ Independent.

A family story of blood and memory and the haunting power of the past. 2018 WINNER OF THE CHRISTOPHER EWART-BIGGS MEMORIAL PRIZE 2017 WINNER OF THE NON-FICTION IRISH BOOK OF THE YEAR AWARD A SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER

A Memoir of Love and War

A follow-up to Letters to Daniel, this collection of pieces is largely taken from Fergal Keane's broadcasts and columns from some of the most horrific warzones he has visited in 1999: Sierra Leone, Kosovo and Rwanda.

Fergal Keane

About

Books

Join the club