The Professor and the Parson: A Story of Desire, Deceit and Defrocking - Hardcover

A twisty, tricksy biography ... a thorough and thoroughly entertaining reconstruction of the life and lies of Robert Peters. Suspend your disbelief ... The Professor and the Parson would make a fine TV series along the lines of A Very English Scandal. Russell T Davies, if you're reading, this stuff is gold. (Laura Freeman The Times)

A lively, well-written story of skulduggery (Rosamund Urwin Sunday Times)

[A] roller-coaster ride of fibs and frauds ... To say of a book that, once you start reading it, you cannot stop, is always a cliché and often an exaggeration. Yet it really was my experience with this one. Various chores were put off and a meal skipped as I kept turning the pages. (Noel Malcolm Sunday Telegraph)

Sisman's deadpan tone heightens [Peters'] comic effects. Often while reading his book in a public place I embarrassed myself by uncontrollable guffaws ... This is a truly wonderful story. (A. N. Wilson Spectator)

Entertaining ... Sisman is a serious writer of nonfiction ... but he has a novelist's sense of the importance of showing, not telling. (Alex Preston Observer 2019-05-19)

[A] delicious true story ... fascinating. (Ysenda Maxton Graham TLS 2019-05-12)

The Professor and the Parson is a fantastic read and fully deserves to be among everyone's books of the year. It is full of wonderful stories and splendidly comic moments. It is also beautifully written. (William Whyte Literary Review 2019-05-09)

Astonishing ... fascinating, eye-opening (Emerald Street)

A tortuous, intriguing and barely believable story, which sheds a fierce but comic spotlight on the ineptitude, gullibility and naivety of countless senior prelates and academics who were taken in by a consummate and unrepentant charlatan ... a dizzy and diverting read (Rosemary Goring Herald Scotland 2019-05-04)

Witty, impressive and captivatingly readable ... incredibly well researched ... a real achievement. It's also great fun. I laughed out loud ... one day this tale will make a fantastic BBC adaptation or even film. Think A Very English Scandal, but with clerical collars. (History Today 2019-04-23)