From kiss-and-tell stories in national newspapers to undercover surveillance and childhood scams, photographer and author Steve Grayson has seen a few things in his time and he’s managed to cram enough of these into his new book Don’t Ask Don’t Get to make for some very interesting reading indeed.

Steve, who lives between Hatch End and Carpenders Park, began life as Stephen Moses, the youngest son of a close-knit Jewish family ekeing out a living in Kilburn in the lead up to World War Two.

The first half of Steve’s book sets the scene for a life spent gathering skills from odd jobs, always looking for innovative ways to make money and stay on his feet. When he was 13, Stephen’s father changed the family name to Grayson, and in a way this set the ball rolling for a man who would become many things and acquire transferable skills as a printer’s assistant, a plumber, electrician, bricklayer through to a private investigator and senior investigations photographer.

As an investigative photojournalist for more than 30 years, Steve Grayson has been the invisible man, just the byline on pictures in national newspapers such as the Daily Express, the Sun, the Mirror, the Guardian, the Observer and the Daily Mail as well as the News of the World. His book tells of sting operations with Mazher Mahmood who has also recently published his autobiography Confessions of a Fake Sheik (The King of Sting).

Meeting Steve for a coffee at Borders, where he is soon to do a book signing this month, my first question is to ask him if he’s taping our conversation – you can never be too careful with these journo types.

He laughs and we settle down to discussing the book which he says has been a cathartic experience.

“It feels good. I wanted to tell the truth as far as I am allowed; the powers that be would be upset if I went any further. When I met my publisher at a bash at the Dorchester, I was playing it down because of the undercover work I did and kept watering the book down. I had been approached by other publishing companies, but they wanted me to unearth and expose the news stories I had been involved with over the years. That was not for me. It didn’t feel right. If it was only journalists who read the book they’d just turn to the News of the World bit but it’s my life story and I didn’t want to write a journo book like my mates. I’m not full of myself – I could say I’d met X, Y and Z but to me, it was just a job.”

Steve has found space, however, to tell of how he managed to get candid pictures of Mandy Smith when she married Bill Wyman, and at the other end of the scale, how he delivered beers in the dark during the Bosnian War in 1993.

“It didn’t affect me at the time,” says Steve. “Before that I’d worked as a plumber in a mortuary and saw dead bodies and blood all the time and it never bothered me.

“I’m not afraid but I’m not a brave person. I can’t run away from trouble but I can’t explain why that is. I’ve definitely been frightened but never of conflict. Anybody could do what I had done.”

Steve Grayson will be signing copies of his book at Borders, Watford on Saturday, December 13.

Don’t Ask Don’t Get is published by Kavanagh Tipping price £9.99, www.kavanaghtipping.com