Michael John Dobbs, Baron Dobbs of Wylye (born 14 November 1948) is a British author and politician. He is best known for his first novel, House of Cards, which was adapted into a popular (and very timely) TV series, which was later remade into an even more popular TV series with an American setting. As a politician, Dobbs worked closely with two Prime Ministers — Margaret Thatcher note and John Major note — and was memorably described by The Guardian as "Westminster's baby-faced hit man". He was ennobled in 2010.
Works by Michael Dobbs
- The Francis Urquhart trilogy, a.k.a. the House of Cards trilogy
- House of Cards (1989) — made into a TV miniseries in 1990
- To Play the King (1992) — made into a TV miniseries in 1993
- The Final Cut (1994) — made into a TV miniseries in 1995
- The Tom Goodfellowe trilogy
- Goodfellowe MP (1997)
- The Buddha of Brewer Street (1997)
- Whispers of Betrayal (2000)
- The Winston Churchill novels
- Winston's War (2002)
- Never Surrender (2003)
- Churchill's Hour (2004)
- Churchill's Triumph (2005)
- The Harry Jones novels
- The Lords' Day (2007)
- The Edge of Madness (2008)
- The Reluctant Hero (2010)
- Old Enemies (2011)
- A Sentimental Traitor (2012)
- A Ghost at the Door (2013)
- Standalone novels
- Wall Games (1990)
- Last Man to Die (1991)
- The Touch of Innocents (1994)
- First Lady (2006)
You might find the following tropes in his books; I couldn't possibly comment
- America Saves the Day: Attempted in The Lords' Day in which the President orders Delta Force to go to London to help with the siege, despite being told that their presence is not necessary. The British Army is having none of it, although thanks to some subterfuge, the Americans get as far as Hyde Park before they are stopped. In the event, it's the SAS who storm the House of Lords to end the siege.
- Artistic Licence – History: Thoroughly averted for the Churchill series which, while using some fictional characters, was praised for its historical accuracy.
- The Bard on Board: The Urquhart novels draw heavily on Macbeth and Richard III.
- Bookends: Last Man to Die begins and ends in the (then) present day; the action takes place during the final weeks of World War II. Linking them is William Cazalett, an old man who was Churchill's secretary During the War.
- Everyone Knows Morse: Subverted in The Lords' Day. Archie Wakefield, an elderly peer who is one of the hostages, is seen to be tapping his head in a meaningful manner. However, it takes Harry Jones a while to figure out that he's trying to communicate in Morse code. And then Harry, who doesn't know Morse, has to find someone who does in order to figure out what Archie is trying to say.
- Fall of the House of Cards: Done in the prologue of House of Cards as an act of Foreshadowing. A bored policeman passes the time by building a house of cards, and comes very close to succeeding before the whole thing collapses.
- Heroic Sacrifice: At the climax of The Lords' Day, Archie Wakefield throws himself on the suicide bomber who's been standing next to the Queen, triggering the bomb and absorbing much of the blast with his own body. At the same time, Celia Blessing shoves the Queen out of the way, saving her life at the expense of her own. Their eliminating of the threat posed to the Queen enables the SAS to do their thing and end the siege. Archie and Celia are hailed as heroes and buried side by side in Westminster Abbey.
- Historical Domain Character: Several.
- The most obvious is Winston Churchill who is the protagonist of a series of four novels about his wartime premiership; he had previously appeared as a supporting character in Last Man to Die.
- Also appearing in Last Man to Die are Adolf Hitler, Eva Braun, Joseph Goebbels and Martin Bormann.
- The 14th Dalai Lama briefly appears at the start of The Buddha of Brewer Street; his death, preceded by a somewhat cryptic prophecy about where his successor will be found, drives the main plot.
- Despite having been killed off prior to the events of To Play the King, Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II is a character in The Lords' Day, as is Charles III (who, unlike in To Play the King, is still the Prince of Wales).
- I Need a Freaking Drink: Quite a few characters have good reason to hit the bottle.
- Lady Macbeth: Virginia Edge becomes this in First Lady, in which she finds out about her politician husband's infidelity and becomes driven to make him the Prime Minister.
- The Man Behind the Man: Used a few times.
- Much of the plot of Last Man to Die concerns Peter Hencke's attempt to escape captivity in Britain and return to Germany even as the Third Reich crumbles in the dying days of World War II. It is revealed in the final third of the novel that Hencke is actually an assassin sent by Winston Churchill to ensure that Adolf Hitler does not get out of Berlin alive; in something of a Batman Gambit, the plan works on the assumption that the Nazis will actually help Hencke get to Berlin as a propaganda stunt, which is what happens.
- In The Lords' Day, Harry Jones figures out that the terrorists, who are in it for revenge rather than Islamic fundamentalism, were put up to the job by a former KGB spy who now lives in London. However, there is in fact a man behind this man, who at the end is revealed to be Robert T. Paine, the American Ambassador who wants revenge for the death of his only son in Afghanistan.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed: Loads.
- A couple of his fictional Prime Ministers, Jonathan Bendall in Whispers of Betrayal and John Eaton in The Lords' Day, are heavily modelled on Tony Blair.
- The King in To Play the King is to all intents and purposes an unnamed Charles III who succeeds to the throne three decades earlier than he did in Real Life.
- The Leaders of the Opposition in the Urquhart trilogy are heavily modelled on their Real Life equivalents at the time of each of the novels' publication — Neil Kinnock for House of Cards, John Smith for To Play the King and Tony Blair for The Final Cut.
- Thomas Makepeace in The Final Cut is modelled on Michael Heseltine, a prominent figure in the Thatcher and Major governments who fell out with the former (resigning from the Cabinet in 1986 and challenging her for the leadership in 1990) and served under the latter (eventually as Deputy PM).
- Being an overweight, left-of-centre politician from a working-class background (in particular, his having been a sailor in the Merchant Navy) whose career has been blighted by a sex scandal, Archie Wakefield in The Lords's Day is basically an older John Prescott (who served as Deputy PM in the Blair government).
- No Party Given: It is never stated which political party Tom Goodfellowe and Harry Jones belong to; both are backbench MPs (and former ministers) who belong to the party that happens to be in power.
- Odd Couple: Archie Wakefield and Celia Blessing, two elderly politicians from opposing parties who have a long history of disagreeing with each other, and who happen to be sitting next to each other at the State Opening of Parliament when the terrorists take everyone hostage. Refusing to leave when given the chance, they put aside their differences and come up with a plan to dispose of the suicide bomber standing next to the Queen. They succeed, but are both killed in the process. The epilogue reveals that they are buried side by side In Westminster Abbey.
- Our Presidents Are Different: The Lords' Day gives us an interesting example — the American President is a woman who, although fictional, is descended from a Real Life President.
- Also the case with every British Prime Minister, with the (right) honourable exception of Winston Churchill who is a supporting character in Last Man to Die and the protagonist of the four novels in the Winston Churchill series.
- Out with a Bang: First Lady begins with the Leader of the Opposition dying of a heart attack while having sex with his mistress. In The Lords' Day, it is mentioned in passing that the protagonist Harry Jones's father died in the same manner.
- Parents as People: In The Lords' Day, the American President and the British Prime Minister are both put through the emotional wringer by the fact that their sons (both of whom are only children) are not only among the hostages, but singled out as the first ones the terrorists will execute. This impairs their political judgement in several ways; the epilogue states that the Prime Minister, who was also a hostage himself, resigned shortly after the siege, although the President went on to get re-elected.
- Person as Verb: Tricia Wilcox, the Home Secretary who finds herself in charge in The Lords' Day, is accused of "doing a Maggie" when she tries to throw her weight around.
- Retcon: In 2013, House of Cards was republished to coincide with the release of the American TV adaptation on Netflix. For this, Dobbs rewrote parts of the novel to bring it into line with the original British TV adaptation. Most notably, the original ending, in which Urquhart commits suicide when Mattie confronts him with evidence of his crimes is replaced by the ending from the TV series, in which Urquhart murders Mattie. Also, the name of the newspaper that Mattie works for is changed from the (Real Life) Daily Telegraph to the (fictional) Chronicle.
- Shout-Out to Shakespeare: In The Final Cut, Urquhart and the Cabinet go to see a production of Julius Caesar. The director, who hates Urquhart, goes out of his way to ensure that the actor who plays Caesar is heavily made-up to resemble Urquhart. For his part, F.U. recognises this and goes out of his way to indicate that he finds this to be Actually Pretty Funny, to the director's annoyance.
- You Are in Command Now: In The Lords's Day, the State Opening of Parliament is interrupted by terrorists who take the Queen, the Prince of Wales, the Prime Minister, most of the Cabinet and various other dignitaries and VIPs hostage. Of the few Cabinet members who were elsewhere at the time, the most senior is Home Secretary Tricia Wilcox, who is found and told that she's now in charge.
