Newest Autobiography Reviews
Forestry Flavours of the Month: The Changing Face of World Forestry by Alastair Fraser
Alastair Fraser's experience of forestry spans more than five decades and having the benefit of the long view he's ideally placed to consider the changes which have occurred over the course of his career. He also has the ability, not as common as it ought to be amongst professionals, of being able to look at what he does both from the point of view of the business and the people who work in it and are affected by it. There's a lack of tunnel vision too: he sees what's happening in forestry both in the narrow focus and where it sits globally so far as economics and politics are concerned. Full review...
My Family and Other Animals by Gerald Durrell
Meet the Durrells, a quintessentially eccentric English Family. We have Larry, the lazy and pompous eldest; Leslie, who loves hunting and the outdoors; Margo, a sulky teenage girl at the mercy of her hormones; Mother, who seems unflappable, even in the most extreme situations; Roger the loyal family dog and finally Gerry, who is 10 years old and has an obsession with the natural world. “My Family and Other Animals” is Gerry's story of what happened when the family decided to uproot to escape the drab monotony of England for the sunnier climes of Corfu. Full review...
The Perfect Stranger by P J Kavanagh
The Perfect Stranger was originally published in 1966, this edition 50 years on hasn't lost any of its charm or appeal. Intended as a memorial, '...made out of bits and pieces lying around me, bits of myself, all I had to bring her. Or rather it's part of it', in the foreward added to the 1991 edition Kavanagh is appalled that his book should have been so widely categorised as an autobiography and states that if he had known that would happen he would have stopped writing at once. To me this attitude is an early indication to the personality and character of Kavanagh. His journey highlights how disaffected, withdrawn, and isolated he is from the world around him, with an arrogance and cynicism that goes beyond the petulance of his teenage years. Full review...
Paralian: Not Just Transgender by Liam Klenk
Paralian is an Ancient Greek word, meaning one who lives by the sea. Here, we follow the author's journey through life, narrated by his relationship to water – the river he grew up near, the oceans he crosses, and the water that later becomes his place of work. A tumultuous journey, we follow the author in his quest to find authentic self and happiness, against an incredible array of adversities. At five months old, Liam was adopted from an orphanage – and thus began a journey to conquer childhood disability, issues with parents, marriages, divorces, and gender dysphoria. Full review...
Miracle: The extraordinary dog that refused to die by Amanda Leask
Amanda Leask has been obsessed with dogs all her life and it's been an obsession which needs the world and a lot of it's attitudes to dogs to change for the better. She's not daunted by the obstacles: she's simply determined to do all that she possibly can to make the world a better place for dogs. Amanda lives with her husband Tobias, son Kyle and more than twenty rescue and sled dogs near Inverness. Very nice, you're probably thinking. Wouldn't we all like to have that sort of lifestyle? But hold on a minute. Full review...
When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi
At the age of thirty six Paul Kalanithi seemed to have a glittering career - and life - ahead of him. He had degrees in English literature, human biology and history and philosophy of science and medicine from Stanford and Cambridge universities, as well as the American Academy of Neurological Surgery's top award for research. His reflections on medicine had been published in the New York Times. The Washington Post as well as the Paris Review Daily. It had been hinted, as he came to the end of ten years training to be a neurosurgeon, that he'd have the pick of the jobs on offer. There was just one nagging problem. Well there was more than one. He had severe back pain and he knew that he was unwell. He had stage four (terminal) lung cancer. Full review...
Before and After: Reminiscences of a Working Life by Edith Morley
Edith Morley was born in Bayswater in 1875 and wasn't overly keen on being a girl, although she found the late Victorian conventions restrictive rather than repressive. Her descriptions of the life which young women (or even women of any age) were expected to lead is exceptional in the way that it shows the tedium and the limitations. She had one great good fortune in that her father (a surgeon-dentist) and well-read mother believed in the benefits of a good education for boys and girls. After spending two years in Germany as part of her education she went on to get an 'equivalent' degree from Oxford University (which is all that was available to women at the time) and then to become the first female professor in England in 1908, at Reading University. Full review...
My Life in Houses by Margaret Forster
Love them or loathe them, the houses we live in have a way of defining our lives. Author Margaret Forster decided to take this idea a stage further when writing her autobiography. Instead of putting herself centre-stage, she allows the houses that she has lived in to tell her story instead. From humble beginnings in a council-house on the notorious Raffles estate, we see Margaret's fortunes improve as her writing career blossoms. Student digs in Oxford, a shared house on Hampstead Heath, a villa in the Algarve and a remote cottage in the Lake District all have their time in the spotlight; but it soon becomes clear that only one very special house can earn the most precious title: HOME. Full review...
Inside Alcatraz: My Life on the Rock by Jim Quillen
It sounds like something from a Hollywood movie. A group of young prisoners make a daring escape from prison and go on the run, cleverly evading capture thanks to quick wits and creative thinking. After managing to cover some distance, the men began to feel smart, confident and quite comfortable, thinking that they had managed to outwit the police. A rude awakening with gun to the head one morning proved otherwise. The circumstances of their escape meant that their capture would lead to a long incarceration in one of the most notorious prisons in the world: Alcatraz. Inside Alcatraz is the story of one of those men, Jim Quillen, and his long road to redemption. Full review...
I Am Malala by Malala Yousafzai
She's a phenomenon is my OH's response to any mention of Malala. I can't disagree on some level, but what this book proves is that on another she is just a girl. One voice among many. It's just that she decided to speak louder than most. We know about Malala because she got lucky. She got lucky because when she got shot by the Taliban there were people nearby, doctors who got her to a hospital, and then luckier still because when her condition worsened, nearby there were western doctors with access to western facilities and she was flown to the UK for treatment. Full review...
When You Dead, You Dead by Guy Martin
It's a little depressing when a 34 year old is publishing his second autobiography, but that's what this book is, and Martin proves he's certainly not short on material. The author, for those of you who don't know, is a mechanic who dabbles in TV presenting and motorcycle racing, though it's the latter for which we he will be most well-known. Full review...
In Search of Mary: The Mother of all Journeys by Bee Rowlatt
As a university student at Glasgow, Bee Rowlatt first encountered the proto-feminist Mary Wollstonecraft through her epistolary travel narrative, Letters from Norway. This book is her homage to Wollstonecraft as well as an attempt to pinpoint why this particular work has meant so much to her over the years and helped her form her own ideas about feminism and motherhood. From Norway to Paris and then San Francisco, Rowlatt follows in Wollstonecraft's footsteps and asks everyone she meets how modern feminism and motherhood can coincide. By using a Dictaphone, she is able to recreate her dialogues exactly, making for lively, conversational prose. Full review...
Strictly Ballroom: Tales from the Dancefloor by Diana Melly
Crosswords and Sudoku will help but the best way to avoid dementia is to take up ballroom dancing.
Diana Melly heard these words at a conference organized by the Alzheimer's Society. It was a subject close to her heart, as she had recently lost her dear husband George to lung cancer and vascular dementia. The reason that ballroom dancing is so effective at warning off the ageing process is because it requires a form of coordination that effectively rewires the brain; activating the cerebral cortex and hippocampus. The lecture piqued Diana's interest and soon she was signing up for lessons at a local dance class. Little did she know that this would open up a whole new world to her; a world of sequins, heels, glitterballs and lifelong friends. Full review...
Winner: My Racing Life by A P McCoy
In any walk of life there are people who are universally known by their first names alone. In flat racing, everyone knows who 'Frankie' is and in National Hunt you need say no more than 'A.P.' Legend is an over-used word but not when it comes to the achievements of Tony 'A.P.' McCoy. He's been champion jockey an unprecedented twenty times and his career record of 4,348 wins may never be beaten. In fact, it's tempting to say that it will never be beaten. He's won the Grand National, the Irish Grand National, two Cheltenham Gold Cups and won the Champion Hurdle three times. Unusually for a jockey he's also been BBC Sports Personality of the Year. He achieved all this by the age of forty one when he retired from racing. Full review...
Life After You by Lucie Brownlee
It was February 2012 when Brownlee's husband Mark, age 37, dropped dead in the middle of sex. They were staying at her mother's house in advance of her grandmother's funeral and trying to conceive their second child. Four years earlier Mark had suffered an aortic dissection, but his health had been stable since. Although there was little doubt in her mind that Mark died instantly, she performed CPR while her three-year-old watched from the doorway, then called the police. Almost before she knew it, they were all in the midst of planning a second family funeral: discussing flower arrangements, cremation and charity donations. How did it come to this? Full review...
Home Is Burning: A Memoir by Dan Marshall
Dan Marshall thought he had a perfect life. He lived in Los Angeles, where he worked for a cutting-edge public relations firm and had an attractive girlfriend. Sure, his mother, Debi, had non-Hodgkins lymphoma, but she had been living with it for 14 years and seemed no worse than ever. Cancer was normal for their family; it didn't interfere with Marshall's favourite activity, 'acting like a spoiled white asshole.' When his father, Bob, was diagnosed with ALS, however, it was a different story. All five siblings in this Sedaris-like clan would have to pull together to help Bob cope with the ravages of Lou Gehrig's disease. Full review...
Bandaging the Blitz by Phyll MacDonald-Ross and I D Roberts
Why would anyone want to know about me, dear? she said.
Everyone has an interesting story to tell. Yet how many life stories actually make it into printed form, perhaps because the individuals involved did not feel that anyone would be interested in their lives? This was almost the case for Phyllis Macdonald-Ross, who served as a nurse in a busy London hospital during the Blitz. It was only thanks to her determined grandson and devoted husband that she finally decided to put her memoirs down on paper and submit them for publication. The result is an exciting and emotional coming-of-age story about a young nurse entering her training during one of the most turbulent times in British history. Full review...
Out of Bounds by Bruce Hugman
Author Bruce Hugman has been a school teacher, probation officer, smallholder, university lecturer, PR Professional, is an international communications consultant and teacher in healthcare and patient safety. Having nursed two partners through the final stages of AIDS, and survived the 2004 Asian Tsunami. A varied and interesting life then – and it is the first thirty years of it that Hugman chooses to concentrate on here. Full review...
Between Gods by Alison Pick
Alison Pick's paternal grandparents escaped Czechoslovakia just before the Holocaust by bribing the Nazis for visas to Canada; the rest of the family died in Auschwitz. They spent their whole lives trying to pass as Christians, and Pick's father, too, was reluctant to have anything to do with Judaism. Pick only learned he was Jewish through a conversation overheard when she was 11. Full review...
Low Life: The Spectator Columns by Jeremy Clarke
There is a story that back in 1997 there were three deaths at about the same time and God had taken the shift at the pearly gates to do the paperwork. Princess Diana came first and was quickly followed by Mother Teresa. Stories of their good works flowed out and God hated to admit it but he was little wearied. Still it was the end of his shift... but then another soul appeared. Jeffrey Bernard! It was with relief that God dashed to the bar to get the first round in... There might have been high jinx in heaven but back on earth Life was not so clear cut and even Taki Theodoracopulos was a little worried. He wrote High Life for the Spectator, but where would that be without its counterpoint, Low Life which had been written for years by Bernard? Fortunately there was an able replacement waiting in the wings. Full review...
Romeo and Juliet in Palestine: Teaching Under Occupation by Tom Sperlinger
Towards the end of Tom Sperlinger's first book, he says education can open people's eyes, making them aware 'that we make assumptions all of the time, without even knowing they are assumptions.' Romeo and Juliet in Palestine: Teaching Under Occupation is a fine example of this belief in learning, an assumption-shattering book that offers a new perspective on Palestinian life not seen on the news or in the papers. Full review...
Elena Vanishing by Elena Dunkle and Clare B Dunkle
There’s a voice in Elena’s head, and it’s harsh. 'You’re a failure,' it says. 'You’re a fat flabby mess.' And she agrees, she is both of those things. Full review...
Hitler's Forgotten Children: My Life Inside the Lebensborn by Ingrid von Oelhafen and Tim Tate
You see that name that credits the author of this book? Forget it, it's not accurate. (I don't mean Tim Tate's workmanlike, journalistic ghost writing, more of which later.) The narrator of this book did change her name by deed poll to something like Ingrid von Oelhafen some time ago, but not exactly how she wanted. She grew up as Ingrid von Oelhafen, although that was the name of her father, who was so desperately absent, in being over a generation older than his wife, with whom he was separated. She might well have had her mother's maiden name if her parents had divorced – and indeed her mother did move on to have a second family, and was terribly distant herself – young Ingrid would plead and plead for her company while in a remote children's home, and a lot of family secrets were not passed down at opportune times. Oh, and legally, due to what little documentation was to be seen, such as immunisation record cards, Ingrid was not Ingrid at all, but Erika Matko. Through this book, we find she was not blood-kin with her brother, her step-brother was to die, she was not blood-kin with her sister, but was her brother's, – oh, and even in this day and age you can still find a changeling foundling. Such incredibly convoluted family trees are the fault of the Lebensborn. Full review...
Half a World Away: Surviving the Move to a Land Down Under by Alistair McGuinness
Sometimes you read about a particularly exciting time in an author's life but later you find yourself wondering how they're doing, how life worked out for them. Since I read Round the Bend: From Luton to Peru to Ningaloo, a Search for Life After Redundancy by Alistair McGuinnessabout eighteen months ago I've often wondered how he and Fran were doing in Australia and I was delighted when Half a World Away landed on my desk. When we left Ali and Fran they'd had an exciting and eventful year during which they'd travelled through Central and South America and then on to Africa, but they were planning to settle down in Australia. Don't worry if you haven't read Round the Bend as both books read well as stand alones and you can always go back to the first book later, can't you? Full review...
Neither Nowt Nor Summat: In search of the meaning of Yorkshire by Ian McMillan
Ian McMillan, poet, radio presenter, poet in residence at Barnsley Football Club and professional Yorkshireman, is worried. It has crossed his mind that he might not be Yorkshire enough, given that his father was not from God's Own County, but was a Scot by birth. In a series of discursions on the subject of Yorkshire he attempts to distil the essence of the county and to understand what being a Yorkshireman means. To this end we accompany him through towns and cities, the Cudworth Probus Club, Ilkley Moor and elicit contributions from Mad Geoff the barber, a kazoo-playing train guard and four Saddleworth council workers in search of a mattress. Amongst others. All of Yorkshire life is here. Including Yorkshire puddings. Full review...
Sixty Years a Nurse by Mary Hazard
“Sixty Years a Nurse” is the remarkable true story of Mary Hazard, who travelled from Ireland as a naïve teenager in 1952 to start life as a nurse in an NHS hospital. From a strict Catholic background, Mary's lifestyle choice had alienated her family, her mother in particular, who viewed the whole decision as doomed to failure. However, Mary proved her mother wrong and went on to become one of the longest serving nurses in the NHS with an interesting and varied career. Full review...
My Depression : A Picture Book by Elizabeth Swados
If you have ever suffered from depression you'll find it very difficult to explain to other people how you're feeling. You're not feeling just a little bit down. A treat or a dollop of positive thinking will not miraculously cure you. You're definitely not swinging the lead, but suffering from a legitimate illness which deserves to be recognised. Elizabeth Swados is a long-term sufferer from severe depression: she's also a talented storyteller and has told her the story of how depression feels for her - complete with drawings, which fill in those gaps which words can never fill for any sufferer from depression. Full review...
The Blind Man of Hoy: A True Story by Red Szell
Redmond Széll was diagnosed with Retinitis Pigmentosa (RP) at age 19. It's now 26 years since he got the life-changing news. Although not completely sightless – he sees shadows and shapes – he is registered blind and walks with the stereotypical white stick. This hasn't stopped him from pursuing his hobby of rock-climbing, though, both indoors on climbing walls and on Britain's cliffs. The culmination of his climbing obsession came in 2013, when he became the first blind person to climb the Old Man of Hoy, the 449-foot cliff off the Orkney Islands of Scotland. Full review...
Chernobyl Strawberries by Vesna Goldsworthy
A book about a woman from a war-shredded country, who discovers she has breast cancer…Not a bundle of laughs, one would assume. One would be wrong. Chernobyl Strawberries is, amongst other things, very funny. Full review...
Caring for Shirley by John Kemp
John Kemp's wife, Shirley, suffered from dementia and loss of coordination and for eight years he was her full-time carer as she was unable to walk unaided (well, she could - but it was likely to result in a serious fall) and took care of all her most personal needs. Probably the most heart-breaking part of this is that Shirley didn't recognise John as her husband - apart from 'give us a kiss', the question 'where's John?' was usually the first which sprang to her lips in any situation. Although she could often have quite an affable disposition she was capable of kicking and biting when she was being 'encouraged' to do something which she didn't want to do. Full review...
