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[[Category:Autobiography|*]]
[[Category:New Reviews|Autobiography]] __NOTOC__<!-- Remove --> <!-- INSERT NEW REVIEWS BELOW HERE-->{{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=0241636604|title=My The Trading Game: A Confession|author=Gary Stevenson|rating=4.5|genre=Autobiography|summary=If you were to bring up an image of a city banker in your mind, you're unlikely to think of someone like Gary Stevenson. A hoodie and jeans replaces the pin-stripe suit and his background is the East End, where he was familiar with violence, poverty and injustice. There was no posh public school on his CV - but he had been to the London School of Economics. Stevenson is bright - extremely bright - and he has a facility with numbers which most of us can only envy. He also realised that most rich people expect poor people to be stupid. It was his ability at what was, essentially, a card game which got him an internship with Citibank. Eventually, this turned into permanent employment as a trader.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1529395224|title=Letting the Cat Out of the Bag: The Secret Life In Agonyof a Vet|author=Sion Rowlands|rating=3.5|genre=Animals and Wildlife|summary=Siôn Rowlands fell into veterinary science accidentally. His father was a GP and Rowlands didn't want to follow in his footsteps, particularly when he considered the strain that being on-call put on his father's life. When he was seventeen he took the opportunity of doing work experience with a family friend who was a vet and was convinced this was the job for him. Before long, he was at Liverpool University. It hadn't - as with so many students - been his dream since he was a child. If anything, he'd wanted to be a professional footballer.}}{{Frontpage|author=Irma KurtzEdel Rodriguez|title=Worm: A Cuban American Odyssey
|rating=4
|genre=AutobiographyGraphic Novels|summary=I used to love the problem pages We're in childhood, and we're in Cuba. The revolution has happened, and Castro, first thought of magazines as a teenager. My friends and I would pour over the letters which invariable ended with some form saviour of the question ''Am I normal?'' and mock the invariable Agony Aunt answer of ''Of course you’re normal''country, hooting instead ''Nohas proven himself a Communist, you’reand not done nearly enough to create a level playing field for all. Well, really, REALLY not!those hours-long speeches of his were kind of taking his time away. Our narrator's family weren' That response perhaps illustrates why none t in the happiest of us decided places here, an uncle refusing to follow that be the good soldier the country demanded (especially as a career planhe would probably be shipped off to some minor pro-Communism skirmish, but Irma Kurtz didsuch as Angola) and the father being watched and watched, and as agony aunt not liked for Cosmopolitan for more than 40 years it’s safe his successful photography business, success being frowned upon. The mother gets the couple jobs with the party to say she has been a fair bit more sympathetic than we ever were.ease some of the heat, but in this sultry island country, it remains the kind of heat forcing you out of the kitchen…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1846883113</amazonuk>1474616720
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{{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1035025299|title=Never Mind the Bullocks: One girl's 10Went to London,000 km adventure around India in Took the worlds cheapest carDog|author=Vanessa AbleNina Stibbe
|rating=4
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=With Nina Stibbe is returning to London for a cute little map of India on the front cover and cartoon cars puttering over the page, I thought I’d chosen an entertaining yet mind-broadening traveloguesabbatical after being away for twenty years. Well I was wrong. Now I’ve read it throughShe's been at Victoria's smallholding in Leicestershire which isn't all that conducive to writing, I don’t even see it on the same shelf as a Lonely Planetthere's always something smallholding happening - as you might expect. But that’s possibly this book’s novelty and great strength. The travelogue shelf is fair groaning under weighty tomes by Europeans digging into Indian life and culture. So let me unpack other side of the delights decision was sealed when a room became available (courtesy of this particular book for you, but don’t be misled: you aren’t going to pick up many recommendations for your own odyssey from this round-India skedaddleDeborah Moggach) at a very reasonable rent.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1857886127</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|titleauthor=Here and Now: LettersChristopher Fowler|authortitle=J M Coetzee and Paul AusterWord Monkey|rating=4.5
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=Reading letters by writers affords It's the first of August in the middle of a particular pleasurecool wet summer in East Anglia. They give us access I decided not to swim at the functioning pool in favour of going to my beach hut. The weather closed in, rain arrived, and I decided not to do that either. When I finished reading this book, I realised it was because (a writer’s mind when it’s somewhere between work ) I wanted to finish reading this book and rest(b) I did not want to do so anywhere near my shack. Sometimes they reveal secrets No spoiler alerts, offer startling revelations about their writers and insights about the times they lived in. dust jacket tells us who Christopher Fowler 'was'Here – and Nowhis first chapter tells us about his terminal diagnosis. There is something very strange about being made to laugh by a man who repeatedly reminds you that he is dying,'' an exchange of letters between J M Coetzee and Paul Auster between 2008 and 2011you know he actually is at that point, describes itself as ‘an epistolary dialogue between two great writers who became great friendsbecause he does. He did.’|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099584220</amazonuk>0857529625
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{{newreviewFrontpage|titleauthor=How to Disappear Completely: on modern anorexiaKit De Waal|authortitle=Kelsey OsgoodWithout Warning and Only Sometimes|rating=4|genre=Autobiography|summary=To As Philip Larkin so eloquently put it, “They f*** you up, your mum and dad/ They may not mean to, but they do” Without Warning and Only Sometimes by Kit De Waal focuses on this idea of parenthood and the awkward 14 year-old Kelsey, bonds that bind family. This book is a memoir focussing on the author’s formative years as a teenager living in a happy lower class area of Birmingham. Her father is from St. Kitts in the Caribbean and her mother is an Irish woman ostracized by her family for becoming pregnant by and marrying a comfortable suburban life are dull black man. This intersectionality plays a large role in the autobiography. Kit De Waal faces multiple hurdles due to her race, her class and numbingher gender. A self-professed bookworm Her parents loom large and fan of the literary greatsare written with care, love, she craves meaning and purpose in an utterly normal teenage existencethe kind of anger only a child can express to their parents.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0715647539</amazonuk>1472284852
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{{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1638485216|title=Sorcerers Black, White, and Gray All Over: A Black Man's Odyssey in Life and Orange PeelLaw Enforcement|author=Ian MathieFrederick Reynolds
|rating=5
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=I can’t understand why Ian Mathie isn’t a more celebrated writer and commentator on African cultural affairs. I’ve never yet heard him on radio''Corruption is not department, re-telling episodes from his memorable lifegender or race specific. Our loss. Africa is moving forward, but to understand the Africa of today we need to pay attention It has everything to its recent past as well as its early colonial history. Ian’s unassuming witness of African tribes as they slowly emerged into the world of the 1970’s is unparalleled for its authenticity and depth of experiencedo with character. This recent memoir is his best constructed yet; a seriously informative tale for anyone who wants to know about the real Africa beneath the surface of today’s mobile phones and pre-loved designer jeansPeriod.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906852278</amazonuk>}}''
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{{newreviewFrontpage|titleauthor=Glitter Bjorn Natthiko Lindeblad, Caroline Bankeler, Navid Modiiri and Glue Agnes Bromme (Translator)|authortitle=Kelly CorriganI May Be Wrong
|rating=5
|genre=Autobiography|summary=When Kelly leaves the USA for a life-changing trip around Dalai Lama adds his words to your frontispiece, I'm inclined to think it doesn't really matter how the rest of the world, her goal is not responds to end up working as a nanny in suburban Sydneyyour book. And her goal is definitely not to turn into her mother I know, having read the book in the processquestion, that Lindeblad would disagree with that thought. She doesn’t realise He knows (and at core so do I) that it at matters very much how the rest of the timeworld responds to this book, but because it tells the truth as this memoir showsit is, there are worse things that could happenin the early 21st century.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1444725149</amazonuk>1526644827
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{{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=gareth_steel|title=The Wolf of Wall StreetNever Work With Animals|author=Jordan BelfortGareth Steel|rating=2.54|genre=AutobiographyAnimals and Wildlife|summary=As if we didnI don't often begin my reviews with a warning but with ''Never Work With Animals'' it seems to be appropriate. Stories of a vet's life have enough excuses to appreciate the proved popular since ''All Creatures Great and Small'' but ''Never Work With Animals''Masters of is definitely not the Universecompanion volume you' of the financial sectorve been looking for. After As a TV show the tax dodgingauthor would argue that ''All Creatures'' lacked realism, as do other similar programmes. Gareth Steel says that the bonus scamming, price fixing book is not suitable for younger readers and the valiant attempt to bring down the entire world economy comes Jordan Belfort aka the Wolf of Wall Street- after reading - I agree with him. To be fair He says that he's written it to Belfortinform and provoke thought, he plied his trade long before the most recent financial meltdownparticularly amongst aspiring vets. StillIt deals with some uncomfortable and distressing issues but it doesn't lack sensitivity, he's managed to piggy back the latest crash via a although there are occasions when you would be best selling book which has been re-released to coincide with a film adaptation starring Leonardo Dicapriochoosing between reading and eating.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444778129</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|titleauthor=Play It Again: An Amateur Against The ImpossibleDave Letterfly Knoderer|authortitle=Alan RusbridgerSpeedy: Hurled Through Havoc|rating=4.5
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=I’ve maintained for a long time that I’ll read anything, if it’s well-enough written. So it was with this fascinating memoir, even though it’s a year in How to summarise the life of an amateur pianist, and I don’t play the piano – or indeed Dave Letterfly Knodererv in a pithy sentence to kick off a note review of music. his memoir? Do you know, I couldn’t even have placed the name Alan Rusbridger in his professional role before really don't think I read the book. A quick browse through the first couple of pages on Amazon revealed that the author could indeed tell a clear story: it is his stock-in-trade as Editor of the Guardian. And the book duly held me through a messy, interrupted week of bedtime readingcan.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099554747</amazonuk>}}
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=0008350388
|title=We Need to Talk About Money
|author=Otegha Uwagba
|rating=5
|genre=Politics and Society
|summary=''To be a dark-skinned Black woman is to be seen as less desirable, less hireable, less intelligent and ultimately less valuable than my light-skinned counterparts...'' ''We Need to Talk About Money'' by Otegha Uwagba
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=0571365884|title=Love, NinaMy Mess is a Bit of Life: Adventures in Anxiety|author=Nina StibbeGeorgia Pritchett
|rating=4
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=When I began reading this book I wasn't entirely sure that I liked itGeorgia Pritchett has always been anxious, even as a child. I didn't quite know how to take She would worry about whether the Nina from monsters under the title. She's a twenty year old Nanny, employed by bed were comfortable: it was the editor sort of the London Review of Books life where if she had nothing to worry about she would become anxious but such occasions were few and living near Regent's Park in North Londonfar between. The book contains her letters On a visit to her sister, Victoria living at home in Leicestershirea therapist, and tell of the events and happenings in her life as a Nanny and thenan adult, going on, in when she was completely unable to speak about what was wrong with her life as a student at Thames Polytechnic. Initially it felt like she was name dropping - Alan Bennett lives over the road and drops in for dinner most days; the father of Will and Sam, the two boys suggested that she is nannying, is Stephen Frears; should write it down the road lives Claire Tomalin and her partner Michael Frayn...and yet, given chance, you begin to see that she isn't awed by the notoriety 'My Mess is a Bit of these people (indeed, she tells her sister that Alan Bennett was a Life: Adventures in Coronation Street!) and actually they are just Anxiety'' is the neighbours and result - or so it is less important that Alan Bennett (AB as he's referred we are given to in the book) comes around for dinner every night since he isn't there for fame value but rather for his own unique place in this rather crazy family life memoir!|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0670922765</amazonuk>believe.
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{{newreviewFrontpage|titleauthor=Ammonites and Leaping Fish: A Life in TimeDaniel Gibbs with Teresa H Barker|authortitle=Penelope LivelyA Tattoo on my Brain
|rating=3.5
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=Now aged 80, Penelope Lively, the Booker Prize-winning author of twenty works of fiction including Alzheimer''Moon Tiger'' (1987) s is a disease that slowly wears away your identity and ''How It All Began'' (2011), is increasingly conscious sense of death approachingself. It may be true thatI have been directly affected by this cruel disease, as concluded in [[Nothing to be Frightened of by Julian Barnes]], 'we cannot truly savour life without have many. Your memories and personality worn away like a regular awareness of extinctionstatue over time affected the elements. It seems as if nature wants that final victory over you and your dignity. This is what makes Daniel Gibbs', but this memoir so admirable. Daniel Gibbs is less a neurologist who was diagnosed with Alzheimers and has documented his journey in ''memento moriA Tattoo on my Brain'' than an agreeably scattered tour through Lively's life and times.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0241146380</amazonuk>1108838936
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=1529109116
|title=Call Me Red: A Shepherd's Journey
|author=Hannah Jackson
|rating=4.5
|genre=Lifestyle
|summary=''I want the image of a British farmer to simply be that of a person who is proudly employed in feeding the nation. I don't think that is too much to ask.''
The stereotypical farmer was probably born on the land where ''his'' family have farmed for generations. He's probably grown up without giving much thought as to what he really wants to do: he knows that he'll be a farmer. It's not always the case though. Hannah Jackson was born and brought up on the Wirral: she'd never set foot on a commercial farm until she was twenty although she'd always had a deep love of animals. Her original intention was that she would become 'Dr Jackson, whale scientist' and she was well on her way to achieving this when her life changed on a family holiday to the Lake District. She saw a lamb being born and, although 'Hannah Jackson, farmer' lacked the kudos of her original intention, she knew that she wanted to be a shepherd. With the determination that you'll soon realise is an essential part of her, she set about achieving her ambition.}}{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Tony Benn0008333173|title=The Last DiariesHungry: A Blaze Memoir of Autumn SunshineWanting More|author=Grace Dent|rating=45
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=Throughout my life I've found that whilst I might not m always agree with Tony Benn's politics, whatever he had to say would give me food for thought - and frequently changed the way that I viewed a situation. He's a wonderful mixture of supreme intelligence and humanity which relieved when Grace Dent is so rarely found - particularly in modern-day politics and it was with some misgivings that I opened this volume of his diaries, given that the slipcover speaks one of the judges on ''compensations and challenges of old ageMasterchef'' and . You know that you''the disadvantages of growing older, the loneliness of widowhood, the upheaval of moving re going to get an honest opinion from the family home someone whom you sense does real food rather than fine dining most of sixty years and the problems time. You also ponder on how she can look so elegant with all that good food in front of failing healthher.'' I've always been relieved that Benn has never often wondered about the woman behind the media image and ''quiteHungry: A Memoir of Wanting More'' achieved the status of national treasure, but surely he couldn't be is a stunning read which will make you laugh and break your heart in decline?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0091943876</amazonuk>equal measures.
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Stephen Jin-Nom Lee and Howard Webster1504321383|title=Canton Elegy: A Father's Letter of SacrificeSingle, Again, and Again, Survival and LoveAgain|author=Louisa Pateman
|rating=4.5
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=Stephen Jin-Nom Lee, known in his childhood as Ah Nom, was born early in the twentieth century in the village of Dai Waan in rural China''You can't be happy and fulfilled on your own. His father died when he was young and he lived with his grandmother, mother and You are not complete until you find a man'Little Uncle', who . This was what Louisa Pateman was only a matter of months older than Ah Nombrought up to believe. TheyIt wasn'd become friends t unkind: it was simply the adults in her life advising her as to what they thought would be best for her. It was reinforced by all those fairy tales where the girl (she's usually fairly young) is rescued by the handsome prince who then marries her so that they grew older, but when his Grandfather returned can live happily ever after a long absence in America there as a distinct rivalry between the two. Then Grandfather revealed his reason for returning home - he intended Few girls are lucky enough to take be brought up ''without'' the boys to America to be educatedexpectation that they will marry and have children. It was a wonderful opportunity belief and Ah Nom left the village and his mother not knowing when he it would be many years before Louisa would see either againconclude that ''a belief is a choice''.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1780285736</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|titleauthor=My LifeSakinu Ahronglong|authortitle=David JasonHunter School
|rating=4.5
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=Born The flyleaf to this little collection tells us that it is a work of fiction. That's possibly misleading. I am not sure whether it is "fiction" in North London in February 1940 during the early years of the Second World Warsense that Ahronglong made it all up, David John White once had a brief career or whether it is as an electrician. Fortunately for the world of entertainment and the publicblurb goes on to say ''recollections, he soon forsook the world of fuses folklore and wires for that of autobiographical stories''. It feels like the stage and small screenlatter. When It feels like the stories he joined Equitytells about his experiences as a child, they already had a David White on their recordsas an adolescent, as an adult are real and after true. But memory is a little quick thinking on the phonefickle thing, he became David Jasonand maybe poetic licence has taken over here and there and maybe calling it fiction means that its safer and therefore more people will read it. More people should.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1780891407</amazonuk>1999791282
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{{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1544641923|title=A Piece of Danish HappinessAmbassadors Do It After Dinner|author=Sharmi AlbrechtsenSandra Aragona
|rating=4
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=Sharmi Albrechtsen was a true Hindu-American princessIt's tempting to think that the diplomatic life is privileged and luxurious. Obsessed with shoes and handbags and designer labels It might be privileged, she saw status and wealth as the only route but family connections tell me that it is far from luxurious. Now you're not going to happiness. But she wasnget many ambassadors telling you what it's really like (it's not ''diplomatic''t happy enoughto do so, no you know), but the diplomatic spouse, the accompanying baggage, well, that's an entirely different matter how much designer gear she owned. And She (and it wasnstill usually is a 't until 1997, when she married her second husband, ') can tell us exactly what goes on.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0241446732|title=Our House is on Fire: Scenes of a Dane, Family and relocated to Denmark, that she began to wonder if it was something lacking a Planet in herselfCrisis|author=Malena Ernman, rather than her possessionsGreta Thunberg, that Beata Thunberg and Svante Thunberg|rating=5|genre=Politics and Society|summary=The Ernman / Thunberg family seemed perfectly normal. Malena Ernman was at an opera singer and Svante Thunberg took on most of the root parenting of their two daughters. Then eleven-year-old Greta stopped eating and talking and her problemssister, Beata, then nine years old, struggled with what was happening. In such circumstances, it's natural to seek a solution close to home, but eventually, it became clear to the family that they were ''burned-out people on a burned-out planet''. If they were to find a way to live happily again their solution would need to be radical.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>B00EAINZM8</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=191280493X|title=The True German: The Diary Coming of a World War II Military JudgeAge|author=Werner Otto Muller-Hill and Benjamin Carter HettDanny Ryan
|rating=4
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=We've had diaries of teenagers, opium addicts, drug smugglers, 'He began writing novels and a lot more. Some poetry at the age of them have been optimistictwelve, happy things, and many not. Clearly World War II was not a place for a terribly cheerful outlook, whatever the diarist. However sometimes but it was not the done thing to be pessimistic, for example when you were in the huge German military and were publicly denigrating the dreamttake him a further forty-of Nazi successeight years to realise that he wasn’t very good at either. Such ''corrosion of morale'' would mean you being put in front of a three-man military tribunal, and most probably sentenced Consistently unpublished for such treacherous behaviour. The startling thing about this book, however, is all that it contains much that would certainly have been deemed ''corrosion of morale''time, yet it was written by one he remains a shining example of the very military judges who served on those panelshope over experience..|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1137278544</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|title=Hospice Voices: Lessons for Living at the End of Life|author=Eric Lindner|rating=4.5|genre=Autobiography|summary=''Hospice Voices'' tells the stories of the last days of some fascinating people while it follows author Eric Lindner through his journey as a hospice volunteer and a crisis in his own daughter's health. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1442220597</amazonuk>}}
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=190874572X|title=Monkeys in my Garden: Unbelievable but true stories of my life in MozambiqueLetters from Tove|author=Valerie PixleyTove Jansson (Author), Boel Westin (Editor), Helen Svensson (Editor), Sarah Death (Translator)|rating=3.5
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=Valerie Pixley and her husband O'D live in Mozambique, amidst its rapidly disappearing forests. Monkeys in my Garden tells Back at the story beginning of what life is like in the Nhamacoa Forest century, I went on holiday to Nepal. I met a wonderful Finnish woman and how they came we became sort-of-friends. I can't remember if it was on that holiday or a later one that Paula told me I really had to be thereread Tove Jansson. It opens with a terrifying scene: armed bandits in their bedroom in I do know that it was four years later that I finally acquired an English translation of The Summer Book, and that I eagerly awaited the middle ''Sort Of'' translations of the nightrest of Jansson's work and devoured them as soon as I could get my hands on them. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>B00DUF1LXM</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1908745819|title=The Boy on the Wooden BoxSurfacing |author=Leon LeysonKathleen Jamie
|rating=5
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=Sometimes when people suggest that you read a certain book , they tell you ''this one has your name on it''. Mostly we take them at their word, or not, but rarely do we ask them why they thought so, unless it turns out that is supposed we didn't like the book. That's a rare experience. People who are sensitive to be fictionhearing a book calling your name, and immediately question whether rarely get it isn’t a true story loosely fictionalised and with a few character names changedwrong. In this case, so I was told why. The blurb speaks of the author doesn’t lose face if it’s not well receivedconsidering ''an older, less tethered sense of herself. ''Wicked Games Older. Less tethered. That'' is no such book, because you’re told from the outset that it’s s not a real life erotic memoirbad description of where I am. And Add to that my love of the natural world, while of those aspects of the author still has some discretion regarding how much or how little she sharespoetic and lyrical that are about style not form, you genuinely come away feeling like you’ve just read a startlingly intimate description and substance most of a real person’s private lifeall, about connection. Of course, this book had my name on it. It was written for me. It would have found its way to me eventually. I am pleased to have it fall onto my path so quickly.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0753541718</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Will Cohu1906852472|title=The Wolf Pit|rating=4|genre=Autobiography|summary=Wild Child: Growing Up on the north Yorkshire Moors there’s a feature of the landscape known as the Wolf Pit. It’s thought to be a medieval trap into which wolves were driven, but as you get close to it, it’s difficult to locate, marked only by a change in the light, a slope of the ground. Will Cohu doesn’t concentrate on the pit but rather on nearby Bramble Carr, the remote moorland cottage to which his grandparents moved in 1966, almost on a whim and certainly with insufficient thought. George Brook was a manager at ICI in Billingham and Dorothy was an artist and musician. They’d been brought together by a shared love of the arts but once installed at Bramble Carr and with little more than each other for company the marriage deteriorated into dark silence.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099542358</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewNomad|author=Judith Kerr|title=Judith Kerr's Creatures: A Celebration of the Life and Work of Judith KerrIan Mathie
|rating=5
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=In children's literature For Ian Mathie fans there are some authors whom you know are not just reliableis good and bad news. Ian has come up with the missing link in his narrative, but always impressive. One the story of those names is [[:Category:Judith Kerr|Judith Kerr]]a very unusual childhood (yes, the very years that made him the amazing man he became). For decades sheThe bad – well it's been delighting our children (and grandchildren) but it still came as something of a surprise to discover hardly news two years later – is that she would be ninety in June 2013the book is published posthumously. To celebrate thisAs always, Harper Collins have published it''Creatures'' in which Judith tells not just her own story but s beautifully written, with many exciting moments. What I most enjoyed was the feeling that many of the questions in Ian Mathie's later books are answered in ''creaturesWild Child'' - with a satisfying clunk. Seemingly all that's now left in the characters in her books and her family - who have contributed to her inspirational life. It drawer is, though, far more than just an autobiography with a marvellous collection of paintings, drawings and memorabiliaunpublishable.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007513216</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Gregg Wallace1999811402|title=Life on a Plate: The AutobiographyPainting Snails|author=Stephen John Hartley|rating=4.5
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=I remember the early days of It's very difficult to classify ''MasterchefPainting Snails'' : originally I thought that as it's loosely based around a year on an allotment it would be a lifestyle book, but you're not going to get advice on what to plant when members and where for the best results. The answer would be something along the lines of the public practiced certain dishes until they couldn't get them wrong try it and then presented them to be judgedsee'. Once it Then I considered popular science as Stephen Hartley failed his A levels, did an engineering apprenticeship, became a busker, finally got past the point where you could be reasonably certain into medical school and is now an A&E consultant (part-time). I found out that there wouldn't be s an awful lot more to what goes on in a major disaster with Major Trauma Centre than you'll ever glean from ''Casualty'no', but that isn' food on t really what the table it all got rather boring and finally fadedbook's about. It had There's a reincarnation thoughlot about rock & roll, which seems to be the real passion of Hartley's life, largely fronted by chef John Torode and greengrocer Gregg Wallacebut it didn't actually fit into the entertainment genre either. Gone are Did we have a category for 'doing the impossible the days when people said 'hard way'Greengrocer?'' as though they were referring to some lower life form and it Yep - that's generally acknowledged that Wallace is a good anchor (and better as hethe one. It's grown in confidence) and that he has a great palatean autobiography. But where did he come from?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1409143910</amazonuk>
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