Edwina Currie

After Margaret Thatcher, Edwina Currie was the second most prominent woman in British politics during the 1980s. Indeed, she was often spoken of as a potential Prime Minister. Her outspokenness and her lively, media-friendly personality won her a much higher profile than her status as a junior minister would otherwise have commanded. When she was forced to resign from the government after warning of the danger signs of salmonella infection in eggs, she was already a national figure. Revealing her four-year affair with former Prime Minister John Major, Edwina's diaries caused a media sensation. A decade on, and now with previously unpublished material, the diaries still provide a remarkable insight into politics at the top by a writer with an observant eye and a sharp sense of humour. Edwina Currie's honesty, her frankness and her courage make these unexpurgated diaries an irresistible read.