Andrew Roberts

Roberts writes long single-volume lives of people he plainly admires, which reviewers treat as either the strength or the weakness of the method. Napoleon: A Life drew on the emperor's own correspondence, some thirty-three thousand letters published shortly beforehand, and took the Grand Prix of the Fondation Napoleon. Churchill: Walking with Destiny had the benefit of the king's wartime diaries, which no earlier biographer had been shown. The Last King of America argues that George III was neither ill for most of his reign nor the tyrant the Declaration of Independence describes. Roberts read history at Cambridge, worked in the City first, is a visiting professor at King's College London, and sits in the House of Lords.