A Very Expensive Poison

1 November 2006. Alexander Litvinenko is brazenly poisoned in central London. Twenty two days later he dies, killed from the inside. The poison? Polonium; a rare, lethal and highly radioactive substance. His crime? He had made some powerful enemies in Russia. Based on the best part of a decade's reporting, as well as extensive interviews with those closest to the events (including the murder suspects), and access to trial evidence, Luke Harding's A Very Expensive Poison is the definitive inside story of the life and death of Alexander Litvinenko. Harding traces the journey of the nuclear poison across London, from hotel room to nightclub, assassin to victim; it is a deadly trail that seemingly leads back to the Russian state itself. This is a shocking real-life revenge tragedy with corruption and subterfuge at every turn, and walk-on parts from Russian mafia, the KGB, MI6 agents, dedicated British coppers, Russian dissidents. At the heart of this all is an individual and his family torn apart by a ruthless crime.

The first reports seemed absurd. A Russian dissident, formerly an employee of the KGB and its successor, the FSB, had seemingly been poisoned in a London hotel. As Alexander Litvinenko's condition worsened, however, and he was transferred to hospital and placed under armed guard, the story took a sinister turn. On 23 November 2006, Litvinenko died, apparently from polonium-210 radiation poisoning. He himself, in a dramatic statement from his deathbed, accused his former employers at the Kremlin of being responsible for his murder. Who was Alexander Litvinenko? What had happened in Russia since the end of the Cold War to make his life there untenable, and even in severe jeopardy in Britain? How did he really die, and who killed him? In his spokesman and close friend, Alex Goldfarb, and widow Marina, we have two people who know more than anyone about the real Sasha Litvinenko, and about his murder. Their riveting book sheds astonishing light not just on these strange and troubling events but also on the biggest crisis in relations with Russia since the fall of the Berlin Wall.

I like the internet. I like that way of talking to people. It's honest. It's a place where people are free to say anything they like. And most of what they say is about sex. Dani's on a mission. She's just seventeen, hates her parents, skives college and prefers life in the chatrooms on-line. What she's looking for is someone who is honest and direct. Instead she finds a man twice her age, who thinks she is eleven and a boy.

A thrilling account of how Russia is waging a hidden war against America and the West, using espionage, corruption, fake news, and KGB-style murder March 2018. Two Russian assassins arrive in a provincial English city to kill a former officer from Russia’s GRU intelligence agency. His crime? Passing secrets to British spies. The poison? A lethal nerve agent, novichok. The attempted execution was a reminder – as if one were needed - of Russia’s contempt for international norms. The Soviet Union and its doctrine are long gone, but the playbook used by the Kremlin’s spies during that long confrontation with the West is back. And the underlying goal remains the same: to undermine democracy and exploit divisions within American and European society and politics. Moscow’s support for Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election has grown into the biggest political scandal of modern times. Its American players are well-known. In Shadow State, award-winning journalist and bestselling author Luke Harding reveals the Russians behind the story: the spies, hackers and internet trolls. Harding charts how the Kremlin has updated Communist-era methods of influence and propaganda for the age of Facebook and Twitter, and considers the compelling question of our age: what exactly does Vladimir Putin have on President Trump? Similar to those of the Cold War, Putin’s ambitions are truly global. His emissaries include oligarchs, bankers, lawyers, mercenaries, and agents of influence. They roam from Salisbury to Helsinki, Ukraine to Central Africa, London to Washington, D.C. Shadow State is the singular account of how the Kremlin seeks to reshape the world, to divide the US from its European friends, and to remake America in its own dark and kleptocratic image. This is an essential read for anyone who wants to understand how our politics came to be so chaotic and divided. Nothing less than the future of Western democracy is at stake.

"The political theatre of the 21st century has arrived, in some style." The Times The most infamous scandal in corporate history. The most vilified figures in the financial world. The most audacious (and destructive) display of greed history has ever seen. Charting the notorious rise and fall of the eponymous company and its founding partners Ken Lay and Jeffrey Skilling, Lucy Prebble's Enron is a pulse-racing and rage-inducing parable, exploring the limits of greed... or lack thereof. Mixing classical tragedy with savage comedy, Enron is published in Methuen Drama's Modern Classics series, featuring a new introduction by Natasha Tripney.

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • An explosive exposé that lays out the story behind the Steele Dossier, including Russia’s decades-in-the-making political game to upend American democracy and the Trump administration’s ties to Moscow. “Harding…presents a powerful case for Russian interference, and Trump campaign collusion, by collecting years of reporting on Trump’s connections to Russia and putting it all together in a coherent narrative.” —The Nation December 2016. Luke Harding, the Guardian reporter and former Moscow bureau chief, quietly meets former MI6 officer Christopher Steele in a London pub to discuss President-elect Donald Trump’s Russia connections. A month later, Steele’s now-famous dossier sparks what may be the biggest scandal of the modern era. The names of the Americans involved are well-known—Paul Manafort, Michael Flynn, Jared Kushner, George Papadopoulos, Carter Page—but here Harding also shines a light on powerful Russian figures like Aras Agalarov, Natalia Veselnitskaya, and Sergey Kislyak, whose motivations and instructions may have been coming from the highest echelons of the Kremlin. Drawing on new material and his expert understanding of Moscow and its players, Harding takes the reader through every bizarre and disquieting detail of the “Trump-Russia” story—an event so huge it involves international espionage, off-shore banks, sketchy real estate deals, the Miss Universe pageant, mobsters, money laundering, poisoned dissidents, computer hacking, and the most shocking election in American history.

Lucy Prebble is one of Britain's foremost writers for the stage and screen. This eagerly anticipated play collection brings together her landmark plays for the first time, showcasing her work from 2003 to 2019. Beginning with her George Devine Award-winning play The Sugar Syndrome it continues through her explosive look at the biggest financial scandal in history, concluding with her pointed dramatization of the one of the most shocking news stories of the 2010s. The Sugar Syndrome (2003) Dani is on a mission. She's just 17, hates her parents, skives college and prefers life in the chatrooms. What she's looking for is someone honest and direct. Instead she finds Tim, a man twice her age, who thinks she is 11 and a boy. What seems at first to be a case of crossed wires, ends up as an unlikely, and unsettling friendship between the two, which culminates in a shocking, and morally challenging revelation. Enron (2009) One of the most infamous scandals in financial history became a theatrical epic in Enron, a dazzling exposition of the shadowy mechanisms of economic deceit. Mixing classical tragedy with savage comedy and surreal metaphor, Enron follows a group of flawed men and women in a narrative of greed and loss which reviews the tumultuous 1990s, and the financial chaos which has spilled over into the new century. The Effect (2012) a clinical romance. Two young volunteers, Tristan and Connie, agree to take part in a clinical drug trial. Succumbing to the gravitational pull of attraction and love, however, Tristan and Connie manage to throw the trial off course, much to the frustration of the clinicians involved. A Very Expensive Poison (2019) A shocking assassination in the heart of London. In a bizarre mix of high-stakes global politics and radioactive villainy, a man pays with his life. At this time of global crises and a looming new Cold War, A Very Expensive Poison sends us careering through the shadowy world of international espionage from Moscow to Mayfair.

Who I am Is not A side effect. Hearts and minds racing, Connie and Tristan are falling for each other fast. But is their sudden and intoxicating chemistry real, or a side effect of a new antidepressant? As two young volunteers in a clinical drug trial, their illicit romance poses startling dilemmas for the supervising doctors. Lucy Prebble's funny and intimate examination of love and ethics originally premiered in 2012, becoming an instant modern classic. This edition revised and updated edition is published to coincide with the production at the National Theatre, in August 2023.