Running the Show: Governors of the British Empire. Stephanie Williams

Consistently surprising, frequently stirring and often very funny... Williams is never dull. She has a fluent, engaging style and a finely tuned ear for an anecdote. She also pays proper attention to her subjects' romantic entanglements - a combination of hot climates, plentiful supplies of booze and boredom sounding the death knell for numerous colonial marriages...a delight Daily Mail The range and richness of Running the Show defies reviewers' analysis. It is a wonderful performance whose prime effect is to demonstrate the vastness of the British imperial enterprise in all its blacks, whites and exceptions -- Jan Morris The Times An amusing and lively book, stuffed full of anecdotes and interesting titbits -- Amanda Foreman New Statesman Williams' research is exhaustive; her descriptions of the colonial life splendidly evocative. What emerges is a valuable picture of what empire-building was like -- David Evans The Financial Times Her portraits of these men sparkle -- Christopher Sylvester The Daily Express Admirably readable...gives a vivid picture of what it was like, in very varying circumstances and at different levels of responsibility, to be an instrument of that imperial endeavour in the heyday of Empire -- David Goodall The Tablet