Review: the Ormond at Tetbury, Gloucestershire

There’s been a bit of a drama in Tetbury the night I arrive. A window has been smashed in a second-hand bookshop. Nobody is exactly sure when the crime occurred however. It could be any time between 7pm and 11pm.

That’s a clue there to how many people have walked past the premises on this particular Saturday night – the perpetrator (presumably) and not many others. Or not many who were very observant, at least.

Review: Aikwood Tower, Selkirk, Scottish Borders

Aikwood Tower: the Reiver's return…

The Border Reivers weren’t big on luxury. After a hard day spent stealing their neighbours’ cattle or otherwise getting up to mischief they’d retire to their strongholds for a few mugs of ale before falling asleep in a heap – and quite possibly in their armour – in front of the fire.

The Reivers roamed the No Man’s Land between England and Scotland in the 16th and 17th centuries, and traces of their presence can still be seen today.

One of the more obvious of these is Aikwood Tower, 40 miles south of Edinburgh. While from a distance the Reivers would find it familiar, however, they would probably be left dumbfounded by its luxurious interior.

Review: The Old Swan and Minster Mill, Oxfordshire

Spring should see the meadows adjacent to the Old Swan and Minster Mill, in Oxfordshire, filled with wildflowers, says the hotel’s owner, Peter de Savary.

‘We’ve sown 60 acres with them,’ says the serial entrepreneur, ‘that should attract millions of butterflies. The watermeadows will be a fabulous place for people to have a picnic lunch.’

The 67-year-old hotelier is talking to me over afternoon tea in the drawing room of the Old Swan and Minster  Mill, latest venture of de Savary and his wife, Lana.

The hotel, situated in the attractive village of Minster Lovell in the Oxfordshire Cotswolds, was bought by the de Savarys in 2010 and has since been extensively refurbished.

Review: All the Devils Are Here

It perhaps comes as no surprise to learn that Lehman Brothers’ CEO Dick Fuld was, and quite possibly is, a man who only heard what he wanted to hear. 

On Wednesday September 10 2008 Fuld had to face up to one large reality, though – that the bank he headed had released third-quarter results for the year that involved a loss of $3.9 billion.

The rest, as they say, is history; the collapse of Lehman, the departure of Fuld, and a prolonged banking crisis.

The focus of Bethany McLean’s and Joe Nocera’s book All the Devils Are Here is how the seeds were sown for this crisis decades earlier, as the US financial system allowed huge bets to be wagered on the sub-prime mortgage market.