Tom Bower explains in his acknowledgements that this is not an authorised biography and he did not seek Boris Johnson’s co-operation. Instead, he followed his usual biographical method of interviewing well over 100 people who knew Boris, some named, some not. Obvious sources are his mother Charlotte, his sister Rachel, his first wife Allegra, his long-serving mistress Petronella Wyatt, but not his second wife Marina, nor his current fiancée Carrie Symonds.
He also explains, rather coyly:
Readers should be aware that Boris Johnson is not a stranger in my home. Veronica Wadley, my wife, has known him as a journalist since he joined the Daily Telegraph in l988… Their long relationship is one of colleagues rather than friends. She played no part in researching or writing this book.
Maybe not — but as editor of London’s Evening Standard, Wadley played a major part in Boris’s ascent. The crucial year was 2007. Boris had always said at Oxford that he planned to be in the cabinet by the age of 35; but 35 had come and gone and, at 43, his rocket-like ascent seemed to have sputtered. For a few years he combined editing The Spectator with being MP for Henley, but he was quickly bored by the House of Commons and widely disliked by his colleagues — David Cameron regarded him as ‘useless’.
The bumbling manner is probably a smokescreen. Boris operates best in the context of muddle
On the other hand, he was a national celebrity and guaranteed crowd-puller, largely thanks to Have I Got News For You. And in 2007 the London Mayoral elections were coming up. Cameron took little interest in them because he thought a Tory could never win; but Veronica Wadley did. She couldn’t face the thought of Ken Livingstone winning a third term. She cornered Boris at a party and suggested he might stand.
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