The Men Who Stare at Goats By Jon Ronson

'Simultaneously frightening and hilarious' - The Times

The Men Who Stare at Goats reveals the extraordinary – and completely nutty – national secrets at the core of America's government.

Often funny, sometimes chilling and with first-hand access to the leading players, Jon Ronson’s Sunday Times bestseller is a story so unbelievable it has to be true.

In 1979, a secret unit was established by the most gifted minds within the US Army. Defying all known accepted military practice – and indeed, the laws of physics – they believed that a soldier could adopt a cloak of invisibility, pass cleanly through walls and, perhaps most chillingly, kill goats just by staring at them.

Entrusted with defending America from all known adversaries, they were the First Earth Battalion. And they really weren’t joking. What’s more, in the early 2000s, they’re back and fighting George W. Bush’s War on Terror.

But why are they blasting Iraqi prisoners-of-war with the theme tune to the Barney the Purple Dinosaur show? Why have one hundred de-bleated goats been secretly placed inside the Special Forces command centre at Fort Bragg? And how was the US military associated with the mysterious mass-suicide of a strange cult from San Diego?

Now a feature film starring George Clooney and Ewan McGregor.

Part of the Picador Collection, a series celebrating fifty years of Picador books and showcasing the best of modern literature.