Biography
Mingus Speaks - John Goodman
Charles Mingus is among jazz's greatest composers and perhaps its most talented bass player. He was blunt and outspoken about the place of jazz in music history and American culture, about which performers were the real thing (or not), and much more. Thes
Rhapsody in Black: The Life and Music of Roy Orbison - John Kruth
Elvis Presley claimed that Roy Orbison's voice was the best in the business, with his eyes constantly hidden beneath his Ray-Bans and singing about heartbreak. This new biography reveals the personal tragedies and alienation that shaped Orbison's musi
Eric Clapton Day By Day: The Early Years 1963-1982 - Marc Roberty
Marc Roberty presents Eric Clapton's professional life in a day to day format, filled with all the details that fans will want to know. This volume covers Clapton's early years, with the next volume to be published later this year.
The Love and Wars of Lina Prokofiev by Simon Morrison - review
A biography of Russian composer Sergei Prokofiev's troubled wife is forensically detailed - but with vast Siberian silences Their meeting was utterly unremarkable: to composer Sergei Prokofiev, celebrating his New York debut in 1919, Lina Codina was one
Review: CS Lewis, A Life, By Alistair Mcgrath
CS Lewis said that the job of the critic is to look at what a writer says, not who he or she is. Still, that hasn't deterred countless hacks and academics from poring over his life and producing, in the 50 years since his death, a shelf-full of biographie
The Wizard: The Life of Stanley Matthews, by Jon Henderson
When revisiting the life of someone as famous as Stanley Matthews, it helps to unearth a hitherto unknown, headline-making fact, as Jon Henderson has done in revealing that The Wizard of Dribble's beloved second wife, Mila, had been a secret agent for theReview: CS Lewis, A Life, By Alistair Mcgrath
CS Lewis said that the job of the critic is to look at what a writer says, not who he or she is. Still, that hasn't deterred countless hacks and academics from poring over his life and producing, in the 50 years since his death, a shelf-full of biographie
This Boy: A Memoir of a Childhood by Alan Johnson - review
One often hears it alleged that all politicians these days come from upper-middle-class backgrounds and are out of touch with the so-called real world.
The Man Within My Head, By Pico Iyer
A singular hybrid of memoir and biography, this intriguing experiment concerns one globe-trotting writer's obsession with another.