Financial Crisis – STUFF HAPPENS

Fifty-Nine Years Four Days published on Amazon (kindle)

My novel describes four days in the life of Simon Tindall, a British banker and MEP (he is, or rather was, a close ally of Tony Blair), who discovers he has only a few months to live. Dazed and distraught, Simon begins to evaluate his life, and weigh his successes and failures. Unable to find intimacy with his […]

by Alex Hickman

Ambivalence

I am about to publish my first novel, called 59 Years 4 Days. The novel’s main character is a middle-aged man called Simon who learns that he has a fatal illness. Simon is a baby-boomer, a successful member of the Tony Blair generation (TB happens to be a political friend of Simon’s, and a character in the novel). […]

by Alex Hickman

The Eurozone won’t survive in its present form

On the eve of the latest Eurozone bail-out, I listened to a panel of four central bankers (an American, a Japanese, a Cypriot and a Dutchman) discuss the outlook for the global economy. The context was a conference hosted by a global banking group. The panellists were a bright foursome and all commanders of their subject and they […]

by Alex Hickman

Notes on Frankfurt

Walking past the entrance to the European Central Bank I could see the tension in the faces of the chauffeurs and the bodyguards standing by the security gate smoking cigarettes. Towering above them is the money headquarters for a continent of over 300 million people, and things are in bad way. Around the corner in […]

by Alex Hickman

April

My bath is furiously hot. On the other side of a narrow window the wind bears knives, the rain ice. To the south the plain rises and cuts out as black as well-water. To the north the vale’s remaining trees dip their heads like children flinching before an angry teacher. The tarpaulin covering my writing room […]

by Alex Hickman

How the other half lives

Europeans have been coming to terms with uncomfortable levels of anxiety and uncertainty over the last few months. Prolonged financial crisis has pushed us back in to recession, and has condemned us to more austerity, low growth and lost opportunity. Each week seems to bring a new shade of darkness. What next month will bring – […]