The Unusual Suspect The Remarkable True Story of a Modern-Day Robin Hood
- 6 Jan 2022
- 9781786897992
- £9.99
- 320 pp
- 129×198mm
- 21 Jan 2021
- 9781786897985
- £7.99
- 320 pp
In a few words
The remarkable true story of a modern-day Robin Hood, from Times feature writer Ben Machell
In a few words
The remarkable true story of a modern-day Robin Hood, from Times feature writer Ben Machell
Completely fascinating . . . reads like a deep psychological thriller, but it's real. Is truth stranger than fiction? You bet
Lee Child
One of the strengths of Ben Machell’s compelling book is its patient unearthing of the various motivations for his subject’s behaviour . . . This splendid book . . . does full justice to his complexity
Completely fascinating . . . reads like a deep psychological thriller, but it's real. Is truth stranger than fiction? You bet
Lee Child
A splendid account of Stephen Jackley that does full justice to his complexity
More about
the book
It is 2007, a time of recession and impending climate crisis, and one young man decides to change the world.
This is the story of Stephen Jackley, a British geography student with Asperger’s Syndrome. Aged just twenty-one, obsessed with the idea of Robin Hood, and with no prior experience, he resolved to become a bank robber. He would steal from the rich and give to the poor.
And he did. Bank notes mysteriously found their way into the hands of the homeless. The police had no idea who was responsible. Until Jackley’s ambition got the better of him.
More about
the book
It is 2007, a time of recession and impending climate crisis, and one young man decides to change the world.
This is the story of Stephen Jackley, a British geography student with Asperger’s Syndrome. Aged just twenty-one, obsessed with the idea of Robin Hood, and with no prior experience, he resolved to become a bank robber. He would steal from the rich and give to the poor.
And he did. Bank notes mysteriously found their way into the hands of the homeless. The police had no idea who was responsible. Until Jackley’s ambition got the better of him.
Stephen Jackley, the "Robin Hood" bank robber, is an Asperger’s student with an incredible, increasingly dark story, which Machell tells with Hollywood box-office wit, compassion and brio. With every page, you find yourself screaming “OH MY GOD – WHAT ARE YOU DOING, STEPHEN?”, all the way up to him ending in US jail. How one young man’s misguided plan to save the world went increasingly, dangerously wrong
Caitlin Moran
Truly affecting true crime. I’ve heard it said that a villain is just a victim whose story hasn’t been told – this big-hearted, fascinating, meticulous book made me feel that way about Stephen Jackley
Marina Hyde
Fascinating . . . In Machell, [Jackley] has found the most sympathetic and intelligent of biographers . . . The Unusual Suspect raises important questions about our ideas of guilt, idealism and the nature of responsibility . . . a tremendously invigorating book, scrupulously researched, sympathetically told, a picaresque tale of modern life, by turns funny and sad
Ben Machell’s deeply reported book is not only a gripping true-crime story, but also a sensitive and melancholy portrait of someone who has long struggled to fit in to society
Stephen Jackley, the "Robin Hood" bank robber, is an Asperger’s student with an incredible, increasingly dark story, which Machell tells with Hollywood box-office wit, compassion and brio. With every page, you find yourself screaming “OH MY GOD – WHAT ARE YOU DOING, STEPHEN?”, all the way up to him ending in US jail. How one young man’s misguided plan to save the world went increasingly, dangerously wrong
Caitlin Moran
Truly affecting true crime. I’ve heard it said that a villain is just a victim whose story hasn’t been told – this big-hearted, fascinating, meticulous book made me feel that way about Stephen Jackley
Marina Hyde
Ben Machell’s deeply reported book is not only a gripping true-crime story, but also a sensitive and melancholy portrait of someone who has long struggled to fit in to society
An astonishing story which resonates at a time of staggering inequality, and one which asks salient questions about wealth redistribution
Ben Machell
View profileBen Machell is a feature writer for The Times and The Times Magazine and a contributor to publications including VICE, ES Magazine and Esquire. He has been shortlisted for Feature Writer of the Year at the British Press Awards. Ben has full and exclusive access to Stephen and his surviving diaries, as well as access to law enforcement and the key characters involved in Jackley’s story on both sides of the Atlantic.
@ben_machell
Ben Machell
View profileBen Machell is a feature writer for The Times and The Times Magazine and a contributor to publications including VICE, ES Magazine and Esquire. He has been shortlisted for Feature Writer of the Year at the British Press Awards. Ben has full and exclusive access to Stephen and his surviving diaries, as well as access to law enforcement and the key characters involved in Jackley’s story on both sides of the Atlantic.
@ben_machell
