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A mystery reviewer who savaged works by some of Britain's leading academics on the Amazon website has been revealed as the wife of historian Prof Orlando Figes. Figes made the revelation in a statement through lawyers following a week of intrigue, suspicion, legal threats and angry email exchanges over postings on the website's UK book review pages, reports the Guardian.
The spat began last week when the Cambridge-based academic, Dr Rachel Polonsky, noticed among the many favourable reviews of her book on Russian culture, Molotov's Magic Lantern, one condemning her efforts as "dense", "pretentious" and "the sort of book that makes you wonder why it was ever published". It ended on late on Friday evening with the surprise unveiling of Figes's wife, Dr Stephanie Palmer, a senior law lecturer at Cambridge University, barrister, and member of the top human rights specialists, Blackstone Chambers.
A statement on behalf of Professor Figes' lawyer, David Price, said: "My client's wife wrote the reviews. My client has only just found out about this, this evening. Both he and his wife are taking steps to make the position clear." Figes had previously been critical of anonymous reviewers on Amazon.
The reviews have now been removed.