Homeland: into a world of hate by Nick Ryan

Liberal journalists like to tell flesh-creeping stories of Europe's racist right. Yasmin Alibhai-Brown worries they may distract us from mainstream bigotry

Liberal journalists and politicians are always intensely interested in, and worried by, violent nationalists, which is proper and honourable. There has been an increase in support for such groups and recent ultra-right victories indicate new dangers across postwar Europe. Immigration from troubled parts of the world, the upsurge in mistrust of Muslims since the terrorist attacks on the US, anti-EU sentiments and a growing distaste for the hegemonic hyper-power are all playing a part in making the 21st century feel both out of control and in the hands of ruthless forces. Voters turn to dangerously simple answers in such times.

This book by award-winning journalist Nick Ryan is a tremendous, scary exposé of the re-activated politics of hatred. His style is bold, the reportage lively, and he makes the characters – some drawn with the power and detail of Dickens – menacing enough that you can hear them breathe heavily into your ears. He meets a proud thug from the BNP: "His crinkled, wavy hair is slicked back and plastered onto his skull. I can detect streaks of blonde, deep beneath the gel. A thin mask of acne cream vainly hides swelling spots. His back remains ramrod straight. He is ill at ease." Other writers and broadcasters have been bringing us despatches from this new frontline, mostly accounts of gun-hoarding paranoid "nigger"- and Jew-haters. Sometimes it passes for entertainment, as when Louis Theroux teases such fanatics with a twinkle in his eye.

But is this preoccupation with extremists, this manic drive to expose them, a little unhealthy? Could this be just a fetish, a temptation for men with safe lives seeking thrills around the danger-lands of Europe, America and elsewhere? And does this obsession with the extraordinary make them blind to the greater risks of mainstream attitudes which have got uglier and more xenophobic across Europe? At the end of the pacey excitement of Homeland, which is engrossing and unnerving, this question hangs over the pages.

Stand about drinking posh wine in beautiful rooms with left-of-centre people these days, and it is never long before some person starts on how Blair is right to get tough on immigration, how awful it is that political correctness disallows such views, and how the identity of "our" nation is under siege. Ryan needed to thread the views of such seemingly inoffensive bigots through the book, a reminder that the beasts with swastikas and knives prosper today because so many decent people have rolled over. Two rushed pages in the epilogue are not adequate when politicians such as David Blunkett daily re-package and therefore normalise the policies and rhetoric of the ultra-right.

In his Preachers of Hate (Gibson Square Books), BBC journalist Angus Roxburgh makes these links more powerfully, and analyses the impact of modern anti-heroes – Pim Fortuyn, Jörg Haider and others – who have mainstreamed themselves and their ideologies.

The most illuminating parts of Ryan's pulsating book are those where you see the chaos in the hearts of neo-fascists. They hate Jews and Muslims (but would work with Muslims to destroy Jews, and vice versa), blacks and some whites. The key movers roam, looking for yet another barbaric answer to their restless urges to return to mythic good times. A monk joins the violently racist Combat 18, becomes a Nazi occultist and, when last heard of, a Muslim zealot. A skinhead in Germany spits phlegm and moans: "Internal immigration's our worst problem. We have people fleeing from the east to the west of Germany." The fury against the US is surprising, and the alliances made by racist thugs across countries truly alarming.

Ryan took seven years to penetrate the dark world of fascism in the 21st century. He took great risks and clearly put the whole of himself into the project. He is a compelling witness. He writes furiously, at times brilliantly. He makes you share his fears and passions. But he needed more quiet reflections and political insights to make the book even more indispensable for our troubled times.

Yasmin Alibhai-Brown's 'Who do we think we are?' is published by Penguin