Raised in postwar Sunderland where life was a sunny experience full of meatpaste sandwiches and Sunday school she has reported memorably and courageously from many of the worlds trouble spots since she joined the BBC in 1969.

The Kindness of Strangers encompasses Adies reporting from inter alia Northern Ireland the Middle East Tiananmen Square and of course the Gulf War of 1991.

It offers a compelling combination of vivid frontline reporting and evocative writing and reveals the extraordinarily demanding life of the woman who is always at the heart of the action.

Although an intensely private person Kate Adie also divulges what its like to be a woman in a mans world an inspiration to many working women.