Mystery Spinner

‘[An] unconventional journey…brilliantly documented.’ Courier Mail 

‘So you want to know something about this funny old bowling of mine. Well, there’s nothing to it. It’s really very simple—in fact, at times, I do not know much about it myself.’ 

In 1950, aged in his mid-thirties, ‘tall, shy, shambling’ Jack Iverson burst forth from obscurity in suburban Melbourne, ‘bowled like no man before’ and became a national sensation, then faded from view almost as swiftly. He died in obscurity, in tragic circumstances. In the enthralling Mystery Spinner, first published in 1999, one of the world’s best cricket writers goes in search of an enigma: an ordinary man in whom lurked the extraordinary.

Gideon Haigh has been a journalist for three decades, writing mainly about sport and business. He is the author of more than thirty books, among them the award-winning On Warne, Certain Admissions and Stroke of Genius. He lives in Melbourne.

‘One of the best cricket biographies I have ever read.’ Wisden Cricket Monthly

‘Even if you don’t care for the game you might enjoy it…Not your standard sporting biography.’ Guardian

‘A delight, a gripping (no pun intended) read, and an object lesson to anyone tempted to try their hand at biography.’ ESPN cricinfo

‘Magnificent.’ Roar