Flying Free

In an era of carefully managed politicians who say nothing and mean less, Nigel Farage has always been something different. In Flying Free, he tells the story of his own extraordinary life with the candor and wit that have made him simultaneously one of the most admired and most despised figures in British politics. The memoir covers the full sweep of his journey: a boisterous boyhood in London, a career as a City trader, and the long road into politics driven by a deep and abiding resentment of unnecessary authority, especially the faceless, unaccountable variety emanating from Brussels. Farage does not spare the reader the difficult parts. He recounts a near-fatal car accident, a battle with testicular cancer, and a small-plane crash, each one a reminder of how close the whole enterprise came to ending before it could reach its destination. He writes about loyalty and treachery within UKIP's own ranks, his encounters with Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, Nicolas Sarkozy, and Jos, Manuel Barroso, and the sometimes hilarious, sometimes terrifying experience of trying to change a political system from the inside of the institution it has captured. What runs through all of it is the conviction that one determined, fearless individual can still make a difference, and the evidence, by the time he is done, that in his case this turned out to be true.