Biographies & Memoirs

A charming memoir about a life lived with cats - now in paperback

If I had not kissed anyone, or danced with anyone, or had a reason to cry, the music made me feel as if I had gone through all that anyway. This book tells the story of the adventures that music leads us into: getting drunk, falling in love, dying of boredom, cutting our hair, terrifying our parents, wanting to change the world.

A MAIL ON SUNDAY AND WASHINGTON POST BOOK OF THE YEAR.
The little-known true story of the woman who headed the largest spy network in Vichy France during World War II.

In 1941, a thirty-one-year-old Frenchwoman, a young mother born to privilege and known for her beauty and glamour, became the leader ...

A moving account of art and caretaking in a time of uncertainty and loss

A poignant and inspiring memoir by Afghanistan's youngest female mayor and devoted human rights activist. As featured in the NETFLIX documentary IN HER HANDS.

Hanif Kureishi offers an insight into the birth of a writer - himself - through this memoir that conjures up a family story of how he found his own literary calling from the ashes of his father's failed attempts in the past even as the world turned upside down and India split in two along religious lines.

Nelson Mandela is one of the world's most revered public figures, a man synonymous with the long, bitter struggle to rid South Africa of an apartheid regime and replace it with a multi-racial democracy. Today, he is seen as the face of world freedom, an ambassador for civil rights, a heroic liberator ...

The author investigates the secret life of Matisse, born in war-torn, poverty-stricken Flanders, whose paintings shocked and infuriated his contemporaries in the first years of the century.

Exploring Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec's life and work, this book seeks to reveal the truth behind the man and how he chronicled the 1890s through his art. Lautrec was linked to the social and political movements of his time and his main subjects were the bars and dance-halls of Montmatre.

A mix of quotations, Bible messages and prayers, which focus on the blessing of friendship.

Michael Coren's biography reveals the complexity and paradox of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle: the Catholic who rejected organised religion, the atheist who later adopted spiritualism, the family man who loved another woman throughout his marriage, the creator of Sherlock Holmes - who wished to destroy his ...

Shortlisted for the Wellcome Book Prize 2019'[A] painfully intense, courageous and gripping account of [Fanning's] journey to the underworld of madness and back. This is a brave and instructive book.' Irish Times'Extraordinary. An account of mental illness, grief, delusions, homelessness, a fractured ...

An irresistible mixture of memoir, biography, cultural analysis, experiment and hero-worship about one person's enduring obsession. Anniversary Edition with new preface published to coincide with the new film, Judy, starring Rene Zellweger.

'I seem to have banged on this year rather more than usual. I make no apology for that, nor am I nervous that it will it make a jot of difference. I shall still be thought to be kindly, cosy and essentially harmless. I am in the pigeon-hole marked 'no threat' and did I stab Judi Dench with a pitchfork ...

Hogben escaped from a background of religious bigotry by the academic ladder and gained a major scholarship at Cambridge and graduated in 1916. During a noteworthy academic career, he found time to be active in the Fabian Society and in the London Labour Party. He also founded the Journal of Experimental ...

An intriguing account of a woman at the heart of world politics, half a century before women had the vote The world was at a point of transition between the Victorian age and the modern world of the twentieth century.

An in-depth look into the life of Romantic essayist Charles Lamb and the legacy of his work

In this powerful biography, Aengus Finucane: In the Heart of Concern, the result of over 80 interviews and extensive travel, Deirdre Purcell explores the life and work of Concern founder Father Aengus Finucane.

A devastating memoir of chronic illness, misdiagnosis, addiction and the myth of full recovery - already an online phenomenon in the USA in summer 2018

A disarmingly tender, funny and honest memoir of grief, illness and finding your way in life.