==Autobiography==
{{newreview
|author=Ian Mathie
|title=Man in a Mud Hut
|rating=5
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=Ian Mathie deserves a wider audience. I can't understand why he hasn't been leapt upon by Radio 4 , Saga Magazine, the Sunday papers, the Daily Mail, Uncle Tom Cobley and all since the publication of ''Bride Price'' in January. Here is a fine new Voice who is completely his own man. His writing is spare, uncomplicated and unassuming. Now Ian Mathie has taken a dusty-dry civil servant and turned him into a hero. Desmond's first visit to Africa is the theme of the dramatic ''Man in a Mud Hut'' story. Set in the 1970's, the intrigue and suspense sort of reminded me of [[The Spy Who Came in from the Cold by John le Carre|The Spy who came in from the Cold]] - and it all happened.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>190685209X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Chris Mullin
|summary=Even although the obliging blurb on the back cover tells the reader a little about being Mennonite, I couldn't resist looking it up in the dictionary. I was intrigued to start reading. And emblazoned across the front cover is 'No 1 In The US'. Great praise indeed, I thought. But how would it go down across the pond? Time to find out ...
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>085789031X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Tony Judt
|title=The Memory Chalet
|rating=5
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=In 2008 the historian Tony Judt was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, a degenerative disorder that eventually results in complete paralysis for the sufferer. Unable to jot down ideas as they came to him, Judt had to rely on his memory to hold them until he had the chance to dictate his words to somebody else. His memory, which was already good, became exceptional. The progress of the disorder left Judt unable to move, but no mental deterioration or lack of sensation occurred, which he describes as a mixed blessing. He had to endure whole nights lying in the same position, unable to roll over or even to scratch an itch, a prisoner in his own body. To preserve his sanity during these tortuous nights he focussed on events from his own past, linking then with other events and ideas it had never occurred to him were connected. It was during these reveries that the essays in The Memory Chalet were not only conceived, but also developed in their entirety.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0434020966</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Robert Leon Davis
|title=Running Scared: For 22 Years He Was a Fugitive - The Corrupt Cop Busted by God
|rating=3.5
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=Robert Davis was the eldest of nine children all living with their grandmother in New Orleans – on welfare. His grandmother was a good, honest woman and Davis loved and respected her, but money was so tight that he resorted to thieving to bring some extra food in for the family. He knew that she would be deeply upset about it, but hunger is hunger. In your heart you can't blame him and it seems that all is coming good when Davis becomes a respected police officer in the mid nineteen-seventies. He's living with a good, decent woman and looks set to have a good career. Great, you think, sometimes life ''is'' fair and it works out.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1854249932</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Denis O'Connor
|title=Paw Tracks at Owl Cottage
|rating=3.5
|genre=Pets
|summary='Paw Tracks at Owl Cottage' is the story of four pedigree Maine Coon cats which the author and his wife acquired after moving back to a cottage where they had previously lived. This is the sequel to a volume called 'Paw Tracks in the Moonlight', which I have not read, and which features their first cat Toby Jug. Apparently, on his demise, they had sold the cottage; but now, a little more advanced in years, they buy it again, and do extensive renovations before deciding that it's ready for another cat.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849016402</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Gervase Phinn
|title=Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Stars
|rating=4
|genre=Humour
|summary=I spent many of my teenage years reading James Herriot's books, and I found that this collection of anecdotes and poems by Gervase Phinn had a real flavour of Herriot about it. Perhaps it was just the setting, for Phinn was a school inspector in the Dales for many years, but I think he also has that knack of capturing a situation, and a character, and bringing out the humour without making the person appear ridiculous. Here he collates stories from his other books, some Christmassy and others not, and he relates them with several of his own poems interspersed between.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141036435</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Nicky Haslam
|title=Redeeming Features
|rating=3
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=Nicholas Haslam, interior designer, columnist, reviewer, the man whom it was said would attend a lighted candle, let alone a party, socialite and name dropper - this is your life.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>009954623X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Gok Wan
|title=Through Thick and Thin
|rating=4
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=Famous for his sensitivity and understanding with women, encouraging them and enabling them to accept themselves, and their bodies, as they are, Gok Wan's autobiography sadly tells a very different story with regards to his own body acceptance. Having gained weight throughout his childhood, getting up to twenty one stone as a teenager, he loathed his body and ended up starving himself, becoming anorexic in a desperate effort to be thin and, therefore, successful. Perhaps this is where his empathy comes from? That when he stands a woman in front of a wall of mirrors in her underwear, he actually truly understands what it is to loathe your own body.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0091938392</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Stephen Wynn
|title=Two Sons in a War Zone: Afghanistan: The True Story of a Father's Conflict
|rating=3.5
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=It's almost a nightly occurrence – that news item which contains the words '… has been killed in Afghanistan' and we think of a young life, or young lives cut tragically short. They're fresh-faced young men or women at what should have been the beginning of their adult life and now they are no more. You feel for them and their families, but what about the families who have people they love out in Afghanistan, who live each day with the worry that the knock will be coming to their door? Stephen Wynn has two sons who have done tours of duty in Afghanistan and who are likely to do so again. 'Two Sons in a War Zone' is his story of how he copes with the unrelenting pressure.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1905570244</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Don Mullan
|title=The Boy Who Wanted to Fly
|rating=3.5
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=There is a Foreward by both Pele and Archbishop Desmond Tutu. Names to make most of us sit up and notice. The title is certainly quirky and Mullan is probably hoping that prospective readers will be saying to themselves, what's this all about then. Good start, I thought. Then I realised that there's an awful lot of football in this book. Even although it's a slim, sliver of a book, there's no getting away from the subject matter. Football. I don't 'do' football. So, I counted to ten, put on what I hoped was a good reviewer's face and started to read ...
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907756019</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Megan Rix
|title=The Puppy That Came For Christmas and Stayed Forever
|rating=4
|genre=Pets
|summary=Megan Rix and husband Ian took on two massive challenges at the same time. Their failure to conceive a child became something of an issue with Megan being, as she herself said 'north of forty'. Time was passing quickly and it looked as though IVF was the only option if they were to have the long-for child. It's time-consuming and traumatic. At the same time the couple became involved with a charity which provides helper dogs for people with disabilities. Puppies come to a family for six months to do their basic training and then move on. And that was how Emma, a soft, sweet-natured, adorable puppy came into their lives. Predictably, they fell in love with her.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0241951062</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Rachel Johnson
|title=A Diary of The Lady: My First Year as Editor
|rating=3.5
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=Along with most of my contemporaries I've never read 'The Lady' except once when looking for an au pair job in my student days, and that, it turns out, is the problem. Before Rachel Johnson was appointed in June 2009 the average age of the readership was 75, the circulation was dropping and the magazine was haemorrhaging money. The Budworth family, proprietors of 'The Lady' since it was founded 125 years ago, chose son and heir Ben Budworth to turn the magazine's fortunes around before it folded. He asked Rachel Johnson to be editor.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1905490674</amazonuk>
}}
