The Reading Monk

How To Kill: The Definitive History of the Assassin, by Kris Hollington is an enjoyable read. The Sunday Telegraph describes it as “A history of the late twentieth century punctuated by gunshots … exciting”, a praise I totally agree with.

And that’s exactly what this 426-page book is about, detailing 35 political assassinations (successful and failed attempts) from 1950 onwards.

Hollington introduces us to both assassins and their ‘targets’. We read about their lives and how their destinies cross paths on the fateful day of the assassination, studying the assassin’s motives and the choice of weapons and methods employed to complete the kill. A lot of effort also went into researching the historical background of each case, enabling the reader to understand each one in its proper context.

What I like the most about the book though is the detailed insight into each of the case that it offers. For example, in covering RFK’s assassination, Hollington also writes about the tragic consequences of his death on his family; the death of his son David Anthony Kennedy of a drug overdose 16 years later borne out of a frustrated life traumatized by the loss of his father.

Hollington also explores “what ifs” – what if RFK had become the President, what policies would he have pursued and how would history have been changed as a result?

Though some of the chapters cover infamous assassinations such as that  of the Kennedy brothers – Joseph and Robert, 1960s civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Pope John Paul II, the 1984 attempt on Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and her Conservative Party leaders at their annual party conference and Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin’s murder in 1995, half the book covers lesser known killings and attempts such as that on President Harry S. Truman in 1950, murderous Serbian paramilitary leader and later politician Zeljko ‘Arkan’ Raznatovic, the assassination of the Congo’s Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba on 11 February 1961 and the link of that murder to the violent killing of UN Secretary General Dag Hammarskjöld in a plane crash later that year on 18 September 1961 – a conspiracy involving the Belgian, US and British secret intelligence services that would only be uncovered some 40 years later.

How To Kill reads like a documentary-drama, fast paced with the right balance of factual substance and action thrill-ride.

I give it a 4 out of 5. I just wish it had photographs to complete it.

Kris Hollington is a freelance investigative journalist and author living and working in London. He has written a number of investigative pieces on subjects as diverse as mass murder, assassination, armed robbery, African drug smugglers, diamond mining, art and jewellery theft, the space race, HM Customs and Excise and police corruption for The Sunday Times, The Guardian, The Mail on Sunday, The News of the World, The Evening Standard, Arena and Loaded. Several of his articles and books have been featured on television and radio (including ITV1’s Real Crime and BBC Radio 4’s Saturday Play).

He is currently working on Baby X (Simon and Schuster, 2010), the inside story of one of the Metropolitan Police’s Child Protection Teams (the follow up to Crack House), and Narco Warrior, with Cameron Addicott. (Source: www.assassinology.org)