Meticulously researched and written with typical elegance and erudition in the author’s trademark prose, @rwilliams1947’s biography of 1930s British Grand Prix driver Richard ‘Dick’ Seaman is a magnificent achievement 1/

Williams melds the personal, the sporting and the political backdrop together beautifully to create a compelling narrative that beautifully reflects the nuances of the story 2/

An evocation of an era as much as the story of a man’s life, the darkness of unfolding history increasingly intrudes on the narrative 3/

First Seaman’s family background and then his youth in the carefree ‘20s, for those of the wealth and privilege into which Seaman was born, and a world of country houses, clubs, jazz and champagne parties 4/

All described in vivid and remarkable detail. Then with increasing foreboding, the looming clouds of international politics as Seaman realises his ambition to become a Grand Prix driver in the context of the complexities of a British driver in a team funded by Nazi Germany 5/

The book ambles along during Seaman’s early life and career but really begins to pick up pace as a sense of impending doom pervades the final 150 pages, where it becomes almost impossible to put down

Seaman falls in love with and marries a German girl, his mother disapproves, leading to her son’s estrangement from her. He is forced to do a half-hearted Nazi salute after winning the German Grand Prix in 1938. 7/

And then his death while leading the 1939 Belgian Grand Prix in typically sodden conditions at Spa, the horror described in writing so excellent it almost becomes beautiful 8/

A fitting tribute to a man who became the first British driver to race a Grand Prix car for Mercedes, a very small club of three, now including Stirling Moss and Lewis Hamilton. If it’s not the motor racing book of the year, it’ll take some beating /ends

Apologies for the word repetition in tweet number two