Last Englishman, Paperback/Roland Chambers

A revelatory and often chilling examination of an English icon, and his controversial Soviet double life. Arthur Ransome was the J.K. Rowling of his day, author of a series of children's books that shaped the imaginations of a generation. But before that, he was an uncritical apologist for the Bolshevik regime, conducting a love affair with Leon Trotsky's private secretary, and comparing Lenin to Oliver Cromwell. At Whitehall, he was accused of being an agent of a hostile nation, and only narrowly escaped prosecution for treason.