In the wake of the inconclusive May 2010 general election Lord Adonis and other senior Labour figures sat down for talks with the Liberal Democrat leadership to try to persuade them to govern Britain together in a Lib Lab coalition. The talks ultimately resulted in failure for Labour amid recriminations on both sides and the accusation that the Lib Dems had conducted a dutch auction, inviting Labour to outbid the Tories on a shopping list of demands. Despite calls for him to give his own account of this historic sequence of events, Adonis has kept his own counsel until now. Published to coincide with the third anniversary of the general election that would eventually produce an historic first coalition government since the Second World War, 5 Days In May is a remarkable and important insider account of the dramatic negotiations that led to its formation. It also offers the author's views on what the future holds as the run-up to the next election begins. 5 Days in May presents a unique eyewitness account of a pivotal moment in political history.
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Details with breathless energy the plotting, late night phone calls and the desperately fading hopes of Brown's government from inside Number 10... Fascinatingly candid... Adonis's description of the hectic negotiations is absorbing for its detail and the palpable sense of chaos at the heart of the British establishment... Flashes of irony and slapstick... Convincing book by a man generally more interested in ideas than tribal loyalties... This book may prove to be his most important work. --The Telegraph
Revelatory and quietly shocking. --The Guardian
If anyone is going to spend five days inside the head of anyone, Adonis is a good candidate. He is intelligent, moderate and nice. The Spectator A West Wing-style thriller. --New Statesman
[An] invaluable book on the negotiations that led to the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition. --The Observer
In 5 Days in May, Adonis has written a classic new text of political journalism. --Open Democracy
This is a political thriller with a twist. Times Literary Supplement It is a book full of anger, recrimination and justice...But this adds to the interest as the words crackle with barely concealed rage. --Total Politics
…as gripping as any Dan Brown page-turner --Choice Magazine
Without a doubt the political book of the summer, alongside Charles Moore's Thatcher biography… As both a tell-all (it's peppered with key details about Labour front benchers) and an examination of coalition governments, it makes for a compelling read. Unsurprisingly, Nick Clegg doesn't come off well. --gq
A fine book. GQ …as gripping as any Dan Brown page-turner --Choice Magazine
Revelatory and quietly shocking. --The Guardian
If anyone is going to spend five days inside the head of anyone, Adonis is a good candidate. He is intelligent, moderate and nice. The Spectator A West Wing-style thriller. --New Statesman
[An] invaluable book on the negotiations that led to the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition. --The Observer
In 5 Days in May, Adonis has written a classic new text of political journalism. --Open Democracy
This is a political thriller with a twist. Times Literary Supplement It is a book full of anger, recrimination and justice...But this adds to the interest as the words crackle with barely concealed rage. --Total Politics
…as gripping as any Dan Brown page-turner --Choice Magazine
Without a doubt the political book of the summer, alongside Charles Moore's Thatcher biography… As both a tell-all (it's peppered with key details about Labour front benchers) and an examination of coalition governments, it makes for a compelling read. Unsurprisingly, Nick Clegg doesn't come off well. --gq
A fine book. GQ …as gripping as any Dan Brown page-turner --Choice Magazine
About the Author
ANDREW ADONIS was an architect of education reform under Tony Blair. He went on to become Transport Secretary under Gordon Brown. He is the author of Education, Education, Education.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
By Mr M Shand
Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase
Very easy political book to read. Given it only covers 5 days it is quite short but an interesting first hand account of those days. How much you believe probably depends upon your political standpoint.
12 of 14 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
Labour peer Andrew Adonis gives us his account of the negotiations that followed the UK General election of 2010, when no party won enough seats to form a Government alone. Although not published till now, Adonis explains that the book was written near-contemporaneously and that shows through in the anger and frustration that seeps from the pages.
The book is short and the main part concentrates entirely on the negotiations - Adonis assumes that readers understand the background and the main political and economic questions of the time. We get a vivid, sympathetic view of the Labour team and of the much-maligned Gordon Brown. The Conservatives are only in the background (since Labour obviously wasn't negotiating with them) and the Lib-Dems don't come out of the whole sorry episode well - Adonis (once a Lib-Dem himself) can't stop some of his bitterness showing through at their turn to the right. It's a very readable account, not bogged down with some of the self-aggrandising that can be a feature of political memoirs, and the reader gets a real feel for the stress and exhaustion in the Labour camp.
In the last 40 pages, Adonis looks back at his account with the benefit of distance and is endearingly honest about his own bias in the first, contemporaneous section:
'5 days in May was written in the heat of battle. Re-reading it after nearly three years, it reminds me of a general's despatch after one of Britain's all too common defeats in the Napoleonic wars, dictated while the smoke was still swirling and the dead and maimed being taken off the field. It is vivid, partisan, and angry about the perfidy of Albion's supposed allies, in this case Nick Clegg and the Lib Dems. Read more ›
The book is short and the main part concentrates entirely on the negotiations - Adonis assumes that readers understand the background and the main political and economic questions of the time. We get a vivid, sympathetic view of the Labour team and of the much-maligned Gordon Brown. The Conservatives are only in the background (since Labour obviously wasn't negotiating with them) and the Lib-Dems don't come out of the whole sorry episode well - Adonis (once a Lib-Dem himself) can't stop some of his bitterness showing through at their turn to the right. It's a very readable account, not bogged down with some of the self-aggrandising that can be a feature of political memoirs, and the reader gets a real feel for the stress and exhaustion in the Labour camp.
In the last 40 pages, Adonis looks back at his account with the benefit of distance and is endearingly honest about his own bias in the first, contemporaneous section:
'5 days in May was written in the heat of battle. Re-reading it after nearly three years, it reminds me of a general's despatch after one of Britain's all too common defeats in the Napoleonic wars, dictated while the smoke was still swirling and the dead and maimed being taken off the field. It is vivid, partisan, and angry about the perfidy of Albion's supposed allies, in this case Nick Clegg and the Lib Dems. Read more ›
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
By sophie
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
I read this at high speed because I find politics very interesting and I shall read it again at some point.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase
I chose it because I am a Labour Party supporter and simply wanted my worse suspicions of Clegg, Laws and crew vindicated. Job done.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
By SM Newman
Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase
David Laws and others have given largely unchallenged accounts of the coalition negotiations. Here Andrew Adonis gives a riposte to critics of Labour's stance immediately after the election results. He argues, persuasively I think, that Labour was right to seek to cling on to power. His claim that the Lib Dem leadership is essentially a soft Tory clique is surely designed to discomfit Lib Dem activists who identify as social democrats. With polls hinting at another close election this is a thoughtful book coloured by intimate details of a heady few days in politics.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
A very readable account of the negotiations. Gives personal immediacy. It also constitutes the opening "love letter" to the Lib Dems for negotiations after the 2015 Election.
3 of 4 people found the following review helpful
By Mike Ernest
Format:Kindle Edition
An excellent insight into the confusion and political chaos that followed the election in 2010. I came away with a deeper understanding of where Nick Clegg appears to come from as a person and politician and can see why he chose the wrong party to form an alliance with. That is disastrously wrong for the Lib Dems
By Geoff
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
An excellent book--to revert to cliche-it reads like a political thriller. Adonis bases his story on contemporaneous notes, and I am not aware of any serious challenge to it from the Liberal Democrats. A fascintiing account of how the Lib Dems, despite having so much in common with New Labour, ended up with the Tories largely due to the influence of Nick Clegg and David Laws, who accepted the need for the Tory 's austerity plan.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
2.0 out of 5 stars
Light on detail. Unusually partisan.
This book lost me when in the opening cast list it describes David Cameron as the 'fourth successive Tory leader to not win a majority'. Read more
Published 6 days ago by Adam Lake
4.0 out of 5 stars
how not to negotiate a deal!
Interesting insight to the Labour attempts to lure the Libdems. Probably had no hope from the start with Brown in the PM seat
Published 6 days ago by profp
4.0 out of 5 stars
Cannot just Cameron
Very good feel sorry for Gordon Brown let down by so called friends n needed Blair's smoothness and charm bye
Published 16 days ago by steve lambert
5.0 out of 5 stars
Comments on 5 days in May
I was very interested by this book and was pleased to have the opportunity of reading it having read the
reviews. Read more
reviews. Read more
Published 17 days ago by Margaret Masterman
4.0 out of 5 stars
Coalition and beyond
Very impressed and a big insight into the treachery and double speak from the liberals and conservatives you must be a tribal supporter
Published 21 days ago by l hayhurst
5.0 out of 5 stars
Thank you
I am trying to read books of UK history over the last 30 years from different points of view. This adds to the collection.
Published 21 days ago by rod instrall
4.0 out of 5 stars
Fascinating account of a lost opportunity
Or, rather, one never offered Labour by Clegg. The pessimism inference to be drawn is that coalitions are hard to make work yet extremely likely in this political epoch.
Published 21 days ago by Andrew Billen
5.0 out of 5 stars
Fascinating insight
Funny for one of the few the libs would happily have got into bed with to write this. That aside this is a compelling read. Read more
Published 22 days ago by Jennifer
4.0 out of 5 stars
Five days that revolutionised British politics and laid bare Labour's...
Andrew Adonis was quietly at the heart of the Blair and Brown governments, one reason why Gordon Brown chose him as a member of Labour's small delegation negotiating in the crucial... Read more
Published 27 days ago by David Herdson
5.0 out of 5 stars
Not very long but rivetting
When someone says "I couldn't put it down', they usually took three months to finish it..... I did really read this over a weekend. Read more
Published 27 days ago by DB
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