This was the era of my parents and the Lynnford novels are a homage to them, their world and its values. Each novel gives a little insight into life in Britain as it was then, and, in many ways, as it continued for a few decades afterwards. Important social trends, some, perhaps, often forgotten now: young people starting work at fifteen, the learnt thrift of years of rationing, the wearing of hats and formal dress …. But also, the more mundane, everyday things such as riding on the open platforms of red London buses, pulling open heavy-iron telephone box doors to make a telephone call, and reading printed newspapers on the train. And smoking, everywhere! For further verisimilitude, the stories themselves are supported by factual references to current political, social and economic events, many running in tandem with each novel’s timeline.

With circulation figures of national newspapers in 1950 equalling almost 150% the number of British households (200% for Sunday titles), printed newspapers were the most important source of news. Who better then, than an independently minded journalist like Robert Lynnford to observe, investigate and report the truth, free from the imperatives of the police and officialdom?