Shannon Matthews is nine. She vanished on her way home from school two weeks ago in Dewsbury West Yorkshire. Madeleine McCann is three. She vanished from a holiday apartment in Portugal last May.Why is Maddie still earning page leads in national newspapers while poor Shannon is already relegated to a few paragraphs at the side […]

What happened in that French tunnel 10 years ago? Who knows?But as the plot thins at every turn, has anyone else noticed just how perfect Princess Diana’s letters were? It’s almost as if she knew they’d be reproduced in a newspaper at some point.On the other hand, that might be what it takes to get […]

Tuesday night was the Women in Journalism Scotland Christmas party.It was the group’s first outing for a good long while and its return at Glasgow’s Scotia Bar was given a hearty welcome – not least for the punch fountain and tasty feast.Sure it’s great to have an excuse for a blether about who’s doing what […]

I happened to catch Women’s Hour last week and found Libby Purves talking about a book she has published with her journalist husband Paul Heiney.It’s called The Silence at the Song’s End and it is a collection of the poems, essays and diaries of their son Nick Heiney. Nick committed suicide last June aged just […]

I know it’s been a while and I haven’t delivered my verdict on Gorgeous Gordon. There has to be a reason for the delay – either I’m so overcome by his carisma that I’m still fanning myself gently with the outer leaves of some obscure type of lettuce or… whatever the alternative is.We pitched up […]