About the author

John Bull was born in 1935. He grew up in Gosport and trained as a reporter on the Portsmouth Evening News, taking two years out for National Service in the RAF. His subsequent provincial newspaper career included stints for the South London Press, where Battersea was his 'beat' area; the Bath Chronicle; and the Southern Evening Echo in Southampton.

He worked in Paris, for the Associated French Press, before moving to Fleet Street where he wrote the John Field column for the News of the World (with a weekly readership of more than 12 million), and worked as a sub-editor on the Daily Mirror.

His skills as a newspaper 'doctor', turning around failing papers and putting them back on the road to success, have been called on many times, most notably when he became editor of Sunday Sport in the 1980s.

In parallel with his newspaper career, John Bull has always maintained an interest in corporate communications, writing and producing newspapers and magazines for large organisations including British Gas and Cyanamid, and scripting corporate videos on everything from handmade bricks and pipelines, to car exports and Scottish heritage.

He returned to his roots in Gosport around six years ago and lives in the town with his wife Amanda, a film historian, and their three cats. He has three children and four grandchildren.