Stand-up comedian, broadcaster and award-winning author Rob Newman talks to Alex Preston about his latest yarn, Intelligence, set in Oxford in 1938, in which spies, codebreakers, assassins and saboteurs become embroiled in wartime espionage, tinged with Newman's trademark touch of philosophy. (Yes... it's Rob Newman from The Mary Whitehouse Experience!)

Rob Newman made his name in the 1990s as a writer and performer of The Mary Whitehouse Experience; and Newman & Baddiel. 'Intelligence' is his seventh book. He has written and starred in many TV and radio shows, including Robert Newman's Total Eclipse of Descartes; History of Oil; and No Plant B – or, the History of the World Backwards. He has performed sold-out stand-up shows all over the world.

Photo © Viara Kitanova