‘Fitzroy Maclean thoroughly warranted a good biography and here he gets one.’ Basil Davidson, London Review of Books The life of Sir Fitzroy Maclean is a heady blend of adventure and achievement. Diplomat, soldier, statesman, traveller, writer and film-maker, he is a modern hero to rival the Burtons and Burnabys of the Victorian era. Now in this biography, written with Sir Fitzroy's co-operation and drawing on all possible sources besides, we have a comprehensive record of his extraordinary life. Born into the tradition of the Highland clans, Fitzroy soon evolved beyond the establishment compass of Eton, Cambridge and the Diplomatic Service. Determined to be a warrior like the Macleans of old, he resigned in 1941 from the Foreign Service, became an MP and joined the Cameron Highlanders as a private soldier. His abilities were soon recognized after daring service with the newly formed SAS regiment behind German lines in North Africa. A brigadier at 32, he was chosen by Churchill to be head of the mission to Tito's partisans. The 18 months he spent with Tito and the post-war aftermath form the centrepiece of this book, but McLynn does not neglect his later career as backbench Conservative MP, junior minister, world traveller and author. Fitzroy Maclean's great reputation has come under scrutiny during the break-up of both the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia - the two countries he, more than any other man, interpreted to the West - and McLynn investigates the controversies that have been attached to his name. In a crowded life Fitzroy rubbed shoulders with an amazing variety of from Churchill to Orson Welles, from Tito to Yevtushenko; his kaleidoscopic career was the perfect extension of a multifaceted personality with claims to be the only "Renaissance Man" in a galaxy of war heroes. Frank McLynn is a British author, biographer, historian and journalist. He is noted for critically acclaimed biographies of Napoleon Bonaparte, Robert Louis Stevenson, Carl Jung, Richard Francis Burton and Henry Morton Stanley. He is also the author of The Jacobites and Bipolar, a novel about Roald Amundsen, published by Sharpe Books. Praise for Frank ‘Packed with fascinating detail’ Denis Hills, choosing his book of the year in the Spectator ‘Fitzroy Maclean has found his Boswell in Frank McLynn’ Trevor Royle, Scotland on Sunday ‘Most entertaining’ Richard West ‘Important, timely and balanced’ Soldier