THE SECRET LIFE

Andrew O’Hagan

Fact can be stranger than fiction, as the journalist Andrew O’Hagan demonstrates in this book. O’Hagan was hired to ghostwrite the autobiography of Julian Assange of Wikileaks. The failure of that project because of Assange’s unreliability as a narrator led O’Hagan to reflect on the array of new personas—including fake profiles and multiple avatars—that have emerged since the advent of the internet. In these stories of deception and subterfuge, O’Hagan explores the issue of identity in the virtual world.

Faber & Faber, 272 pages, £14.99