Facebook Twitter Pinterest
£13.60
  • RRP: £20.00
  • You Save: £6.40 (32%)
FREE Delivery in the UK.
In stock.
Dispatched from and sold by Amazon. Gift-wrap available.
Dispatch to:
France - Mainland
To see addresses, please
Or
Please enter a valid UK postcode.
Or

Have one to sell?
Sell on Amazon
Flip to back Flip to front
Listen Playing... Paused   You're listening to a sample of the Audible audio edition.
Learn more
See this image

Unleashing Demons: The Inside Story of Brexit Hardcover – 4 Oct 2016

by Craig Oliver (Author)
4.3 out of 5 stars 46 customer reviews
See all formats and editions Hide other formats and editions
Amazon Price
New from Used from
Kindle Edition
"Please retry"
£9.99
— —
Hardcover
"Please retry"
£13.60
£9.67 £11.86
Paperback
"Please retry"
£9.99
£9.99 —
Audio Download, Unabridged
"Please retry"
£0.00
Free with your Audible trial
Want it delivered by Friday, 25 Nov.? Order within 30 hrs 20 mins and choose Priority Delivery at checkout. Details
Note: This item is eligible for click and collect. Details
Pick up your parcel at a time and place that suits you.
  • Choose from over 13,000 locations across the UK
  • Prime members get unlimited deliveries at no additional cost
How to order to an Amazon Pickup Location?
  1. Find your preferred location and add it to your address book
  2. Dispatch to this address when you check out
Learn more
Top Deals in Books
See the latest top deals in Books. Shop now
£13.60 FREE Delivery in the UK. In stock. Dispatched from and sold by Amazon. Gift-wrap available.
click to open popover

Frequently Bought Together

  • Unleashing Demons: The Inside Story of Brexit
  • +
  • All Out War: The Full Story of How Brexit Sank Britain's Political Class
  • +
  • The Brexit Club: The Inside Story of the Leave Campaign's Shock Victory
Total price: £39.69
Buy the selected items together

Enter your mobile number or email address below and we'll send you a link to download the free Kindle App. Then you can start reading Kindle books on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required.

  • Apple
  • Android
  • Windows Phone

To get the free app, enter your mobile phone number.
Top Deals in Books
See the latest top deals in Books. Shop now

Product details

Product Description

Review

UNLEASHING DEMONS...HAS THE VIVIDNESS AND PACE OF A POLITICAL THRILLER. EXTRAORDINARILY CANDID... (Financial Times)

THE BOOK THAT WILL SET WESTMINSTER ABLAZE (Mail on Sunday)

Gripping reading (New Statesman)

Craig Oliver's account of his time as David Cameron's Director of Communications in Downing Street during the EU referendum will almost certainly prove to be the most important document for understanding what happened and why it all ended as it did. Oliver has managed the difficult trick of being frank as well as loyal, and his words have a remarkable immediacy. I found his book utterly fascinating, and I suspect that every historian of the period will regard it as indispensable to appreciating this extraordinary phase in our history. (John Simpson)

Part memoir, part diary, this is one of the most vivid, frank and exciting inside accounts to have been written for years. It points its forensic beam into the inner sanctums of power during one of the most crucial episodes in British history since the war. Stunning and highly readable. It will make uncomfortable reading for a few, but hugely enlightening and enjoyable reading for the many. (Anthony Seldon)

Wish you could have been a fly on the wall of Number 10 during the EU referendum campaign? No need. This is the compelling insider's account of the man who was at the centre of the Downing Street web as David Cameron took the decisions which led to Britain voting to leave the EU. (Nick Robinson)

A gripping fly-on-the-wall account of the frenzy in Downing Street during the EU campaign. (Robert Peston)

This is contemporary history at its best...It has pace, insider info and a bit of chutzpah.' (Iain Dale)

Book Description

David Cameron's Director of Politics and Communications, Craig Oliver takes us behind the scenes of the EU referendum.

See all Product Description

Customer Reviews

Top Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 starsUnleashing Demons: The Inside Story of Brexit
By S Riaz HALL OF FAMETOP 50 REVIEWERVINE VOICE on 6 Oct. 2016
Format: Kindle Edition Verified Purchase
Subtitled, “The Inside Story of Brexit,” this is the first in what will, undoubtedly, be many books about the referendum. It does, however, have a very interesting author – both in terms of his level of involvement and his access to the major players and in his obvious commitment to the Remain campaign. Craig Oliver was David Cameron’s Director of Politics and Communications and this book takes us through January, 2016, with Cameron renegotiating a deal with Europe, up until the aftermath of the referendum.

The beginning of the book opens on the 23rd of June, 2016, with early suggestions that Leave has lost and Remain has won. Oliver is feeling that it will be close, but he is confident and, indeed, Nigel Farage concedes defeat. However, in politics, as we know, anything can change and, as the results begin to come in, optimism turns to pessimism. The Prime Minister texts, “How worried should we be?” Of course, we now know the result and this book then asks what went wrong and why…

The referendum was a central promise in the Conservative 2015 election manifesto. It is clear, from this work, that Oliver believed that the electorate would not vote against their own pockets and that the economy would trump immigration as the primary concern. It was also assumed that the three million voters who had not voted in the recent general election would not turn out to vote in the referendum, when, many disaffected voters did, in fact, turn out to vote Leave. History is usually written by the winner – this is the story of the referendum from the losing side.

This book begins with cries for the Remain Campaign to be more proactive and this is a theme which follows through the book.Read more ›
5 Comments 28 people found this helpful. Was this review helpful to you? Yes No Sending feedback...
Thank you for your feedback.
Sorry, we failed to record your vote. Please try again
Report abuse
5.0 out of 5 starsThe definitive account of the referendum that changed Britain
By Dfk on 9 Oct. 2016
Format: Hardcover
Brilliant. This is a very personal, sometimes painful, account of a campaign that will define Britain for generations to come. Oliver manages to balance his two trades here; his journalism is evident in the critical analysis and his loyalty to the PM comes through in the personal anecdotes and the sheer frustration of the situation he and his boss find themselves in. No-one comes out it particularly well and no-one is spared, which all adds to the readibility. It's genuinely a page-turner to read. And it will probably serve history too, as the definitive account of the failed 'Remain' campaign. Highly recommended. And sobering too.
Comment 6 people found this helpful. Was this review helpful to you? Yes No Sending feedback...
Thank you for your feedback.
Sorry, we failed to record your vote. Please try again
Report abuse
2.0 out of 5 starsShould have waited.
By William Carpenter on 7 Oct. 2016
Format: Hardcover Verified Purchase
Just finished this book. It should have been so much better, but the author perhaps should have left writing it until he had calmed down a bit. It oozes with a sense of indignation, so much that the raw information imparted is lost. Clearly Theresa May is given a hard time - events have dictated that the old Tory Government guard have thought it necessary to turn the knife in print.

Should you buy it? By all means, but don't expect an especially lucid or reflective account.
Comment 11 people found this helpful. Was this review helpful to you? Yes No Sending feedback...
Thank you for your feedback.
Sorry, we failed to record your vote. Please try again
Report abuse
3.0 out of 5 starsThe trial of disobedient voters. How the 'wrong' result occurred.
By L. S. Sinclair on 17 Oct. 2016
Format: Hardcover Verified Purchase
The author adds a few juicy titbits about machinations behind the scenes. But the overwhelming message is that the author feels betrayed that the Remain Camp failed to convince the voters.
Oliver writes of his disappointment that young voters did not emerge to vote Remain. This shows a disturbing lack of insight. Traditionally older people have always been more inclined to engage with politics.
Cameron and Osborne are adorned with shining halo's, defenders of the EU.
He fails to understand why Britain voted out.
Mandelson features, and displays insight into the reasons Remain lost.
There will be other books. It was interesting to read the machinations from both camps.
2 Comments 7 people found this helpful. Was this review helpful to you? Yes No Sending feedback...
Thank you for your feedback.
Sorry, we failed to record your vote. Please try again
Report abuse
5.0 out of 5 starsTold Like No Other Can
By Justinian on 20 Nov. 2016
Format: Hardcover Verified Purchase
The author has undoubtedly performed a service to inform future generations about how the referendum to renounce the European treaties came about and learn of the extraordinary way in which the campaign was conducted.

Far from an organised informed debate the author describes the diabolical spectacle of a level of malevolence unsurpassed in England for several centuries and despite all modern means of communication a most misinformed and misdirected campaign wrought with confusion and populist demagoguery.

The whole idea seems misconceived from the start. To ask the public whether we should remain in the EU is not a question most people could sensibly answer unless they held a master’s degree in economics, and international trade. What is quite evident from this story is an ill-informed truncated simpleton’s approach to some of the most complex and intricate questions concerning the trading future of the UK submerged by an emotional debate on immigration which proved the winning mischievous theme of the malcontents.

Of course the malcontents won inevitably in an ill thought out campaign especially when the Remain campaign failed to mobilise and focus on what should have been an overwhelming case against the misconceptions of the Leave campaign. This was a nasty low level political campaign which Oliver well describes. His critique of the role of the BBC is well founded. Their incompetent and mischievous reporting must be called into question. They, amongst many others have badly damaged their reputation; it is certainly not the organisation that won its spurs in fighting for the freedom of Europe in World War 2. This time it has facilitated perhaps the greatest geo-political mistake in modern British history.Read more ›
Comment Was this review helpful to you? Yes No Sending feedback...
Thank you for your feedback.
Sorry, we failed to record your vote. Please try again
Report abuse

Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 starsEssential Brexit reading

A unique insight. Nowhere else will you get the inside perspective of how and why the EU referendum was fought.

Published 5 days ago by alan
5.0 out of 5 starsFive Stars

Wickedly enjoyable

Published 6 days ago by Amazon Customer
5.0 out of 5 starsExcellent

Excellent. A great book.

Published 7 days ago by B. Morrell
4.0 out of 5 starsMore Stories About Buildings and Food

This is a valuable insider account of the Remain campaign in the referendum. It shows how closely the campaign was controlled from No 10, how much it was shaped by internal Tory... Read more

Published 12 days ago by Shale Bing
1.0 out of 5 starsOne Star

Banal and boring. A constant undercurrent of self pity.

Published 14 days ago by Amazon Customer
5.0 out of 5 starsAbsolutely fab read !

Best book I have read in years ! Brilliant, couldn't put it down !

Published 14 days ago by Keith Young
5.0 out of 5 starsFive Stars

Fascinating, confirming what I thought most of the time during the campaign.

Published 16 days ago by Amazon Customer
5.0 out of 5 starsA wonderful book.....Great insights

Worth a read...How did David Cameron lose this referendum... How did they plan...Inside story from someone who was heavily involved.....

Published 17 days ago by B Sinniah
5.0 out of 5 starsFive Stars

Great book could put it down even though I knew what happend!

Published 18 days ago by Amazon Customer
5.0 out of 5 starsFive Stars

Fantastic book

Published 19 days ago by Amazon Customer

There's a problem loading this menu at the moment.

Learn more about Amazon Prime.

Look for similar items by category

Feedback