F. and I do have bus passes which enable us to travel free on all local buses – well except in Wales and Scotland, which is a pity. Still, what a privilege and how we make use of them. There are arguments currently going the rounds that the elderly are well-off and that the young should be given free bus passes in their place. However, how else would half the country spend their time, and what mischief would they get up to? Perhaps more to the point, if a pensioner takes a bus journey to somewhere he or she wouldn’t otherwise be going and spends money in that place, even if only a cup of tea and a biscuit then economic benefit has been gained. And before any political party is brave enough to abolish bus passes for the elders (and betters), they should first do the economic sums. All this a result of me picking up my copy of ‘Bus-pass Britain Rides Again’. A terrific book with individual contributors talking in some detail about their favourite (free) journeys. So many places to see, so little time! Having thoroughly enjoyed my re-read I sent away for ‘Route 63’ where Dave Hadfield travels the length and breadth of England on his bus-pass. A book of mild enjoyment. It is more stream of consciousness pub humour than anything else. You have to admire Dave. His free bus pass is because he has Parkinson’s. He is obviously someone you would really like to have a few pints with, but I could have done with just a bit less humour and witty asides and very subjective assessment and more nitty gritty.

Robert Harris has to be one of my very favourite authors. His books are so compelling and so well-researched. His Cicero trilogy was so convincing that you really felt he had got to grips with what it was like to live in Ancient Rome. In ‘Munich’ he turns his attention to what went on in the two Governments – Germany and Britain – as events took their turn for the worse. He builds up a very believable main character in Hugh Legat a member of the Diplomatic Service who becomes intimately involved in key events as he does more and more work for Chamberlain. But I was particularly impressed with how we get a very rounded impression indeed of what Chamberlain was like and what he stood for. Much maligned by many historians this novel gives an alternative view and is all the better for that. And who is to say it is not correct? The Victorian historian Maitland cautioned ‘We should always be aware that what now lies in the past once lay in the future’ (something many historians do not understand), and it is from this exact premise that Robert Harris constructs his novel. Very enjoyable indeed. there was program on TV recently about the Booker Prize where one commentator bemoaned the fact that someone such as Robert Harris would never win the Booker. How right he was. Better Robert Harris than a lot of the pretentious crap (excuse me) that does actually win.