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[[Category:Biography|*]]
[[Category:New Reviews|Biography]]==Biography==__NOTOC__<!-- INSERT NEW REVIEWS BELOW HERE-->{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Maureen EmersonMaxim Gorky and Bryan Karetnyk (translator)|title=Escape to ProvenceReminiscences of Tolstoy, Chekhov and Andreyev|rating=43.5
|genre=Biography
|summary=In Biographies are often seen as the 1920s two womenform of life-writing which offers less colour; it can be seen as more objective and less personal. I think that Gorky completely rejects this perspective, one Americanand offers a vibrant, one British, settled in the south subjective yet informed portrait of three of France, both for different reasonshis literary contemporaries. Elisabeth Starr had left her home in Philadelphia after an unhappy childhood and In the death, possibly suicidefirst section of this book, Tolstoy complains to his friend Gorky that: ''you write not of her fiancéreal life as it is, a nephew but of the American Presidentwhat you yourself imagine it to be. Drawn Whom would it help to Parisknow how I see this tower, ''the chosen European city for the sophisticated and wellthat sea, or that Tartar -heeled of the New Worldwhy should it interest anyone? Of what use is it?''. Well, she worked as Maxim Gorky shows exactly what can be gained from a nurse during the Great Warsubjective account, then moved giving us access to Provence where she made her home in an ancient stone house, the Castellohow he saw Tolstoy, Chekhov and took French citizenship. Winifred (Peggy) Fortescue was the wife of the Royal Librarian at Windsor, who retired Andreyev in 1926 with a knighthood and became a renowned (though hardly successful in financial terms) military historian. After the fall such privileged detail that one almost feels unworthy of the pound, it was hard for them to make ends meet in England, and they were drawn to find a property in Provence partly by the lifestyle, partly by a favourable exchange rate.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0955832101</amazonuk>1804271977
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Sushila Anand Ian Penman|title=Daisy: The Lives and Loves of the Countess of WarwickErik Satie Three Piece Suite|rating=43.5
|genre=Biography
|summary=Born Daisy Maynard in 1861This unconventional biography somewhat mirrors Satie's admittedly effusive personality: whimsical, experimental and creative. It is divided into three sections: the Countess of Warwick lived a colourful life by any standards. She was notoriously promiscuousfirst, an essay, the second, a spendthrift who did not hesitate to try an A-Z encyclopedia on Satie and provoke the third, a royal scandal to shore up her parlous finances'Satie Diary', and although she relished her lifestyle to the fulldocumenting Ian Penman's thoughts surrounding Satie, she spent several years fighting wholeheartedly for the pioneer socialists in Britainhis muse.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0749909773</amazonuk>1804271535
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Michael LewisJacqueline Feldman|title=The Blind SidePrecarious Lease|rating=43.5|genre=SportBiography|summary=I think my husband was a little taken aback The title of this novel refers to see me curled up on the sofa engrossed in a book about American Football. I suppose I should admit that I didnFrench legal term ('t actually know it was going to be about American Football. Well, I knew it was about a boy who 'bail précaire'played'' American Football) associated with squatters in France, affording them temporary suspension from eviction charges and processes, but I'd thought that was just going to be the background storyfew scant property rights. Among mentions of other squats dotted around Paris like Le Carrosse and La Miroiterie, you knowFeldman takes particular interest in one squat of massive proportions which adopted an almost mythical status for its inhabitants, admirers and detractors alike: Le Bloc. Something like in a haven for artists and marginal members of society (as one character, Le Général, repeats throughout, ''Jerry MaguireI live on the margins of the margins of the margins''. So the first chapter seemed to go on and on forever), and I thought my head might pop from reading about quarterbacks and blind sides and plays and offence and defence and running statistics...but then somehow I stumbled Le Bloc was subject to the real heart continual threat of eviction and the story; the story of Michael Oher, a young African-American pressures from above which oppressed its inhabitants' lives. We follow Le Bloc from the slums of Memphis whose father was never aroundits opening in 2012 until its eventual dissolution, and whose mother was framed as a drug addict and lost him to social services at a young agetragedy in this book.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>039333838X</amazonuk>1804271403
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Billy HopkinsJacqueline Rose|title=Tommy's WorldWomen in Dark Times
|rating=4
|genre=Biography
|summary=I came to this biography having read three ''The world of Hardy's novels, two quite recently, and some the unconscious is not the antagonist of his poetrypolitical life, but knowing very little about him as a person. Claire Tomalin has brought him admirably to life in these pages.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141017414</amazonuk>}}its steadfast companion, the hidden place or backdrop where any true revolution must begin…''
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Graham McCannClaire Dederer|title=Bounder!Monsters: The Biography of Terry-ThomasWhat Do We Do with Great Art by Bad People?|rating=4.53|genre=BiographyPolitics and Society|summary=When I was Dederer sets out to unveil what she calls a ''biography of the audience'' in my early teensa deconstructed, thoroughly nitpicked, it sometimes seemed as if Terry-Thomas was one exploration of the stars old aphorism of almost every other five-star British comedy film aroundseparating the art from the artist in the context of contemporary ''cancel culture''. Dederer's work is original and expressive. The reader gets the impression that the thoughts simply sprang and leapt from her brilliant mind and onto the page. He was certainly one of In particular, the prologue packs a punch: she simultaneously condemns and exalts the most recognizable characters of all with director Roman Polanski, an artist she personally admires for his gap-toothed grinart, cigarette holder and inimitable yet despises for his actions. This model of 'Hel-lo!', monstrous men'Hard cheese!'as she calls them, is consistent for the first few chapters, interrogating the likes of Woody Allen, Michael Jackson and Pablo Picasso. Her critical voice is acutely present throughout, never slipping into anonymity and best of allmaintaining her own subjectivity, as she holds it so dearly, the angryand a personal, 'You're an absolute shower!'rather than collective voice.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1845134419</amazonuk>1399715070
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Stella Tillyard 1788360702|title=A Royal AffairCharles, The Alternative Prince: George III and His Troublesome SiblingsAn Unauthorised Biography|author=Edzard Ernst
|rating=4
|genre=Biography
|summary=King George III was not the luckiest For over forty years, Prince Charles has been an ardent supporter of English sovereignsalternative medicine and complementary therapies. America''Charles, The Alternative Prince'' critically assesses the Prince's opinions, beliefs and then his sons, in that order, gave him no end aims against the background of grief, and the last scientific evidence. There are few years instances of his life were clouded by madness. It beliefs being vindicated and his relentless promotion of treatments which have no scientific support has done considerable damage to the reputation of a man who is thus often overlooked that, before these troubles arose proud of his refusal to haunt this most conscientious monarchapply evidence-based, he also had a thankless task in trying logical reasoning to control his siblingsambitions.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099428563</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Tracy Borman 1739805100|title=Elizabeth's WomenLoving the Enemy: The Hidden Story Building bridges in a time of the Virgin Queenwar|author=Andrew March
|rating=4.5
|genre=Biography
|summary=So many biographies have been written about ''Loving the life and times Enemy'' tells the quite extraordinary story of Englandauthor Andrew March's longest-lived and longest reigning sovereign that one might wonder whether there is anything new left grandparents, who first met when grandfather Fred Clayton went to Dresden to say about her. However Tracy Borman has found an interesting new angle – by telling the story of her life through teach in the women closest to her.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224082264</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=James Lever|title=Me Cheeta|rating=4|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Straight out early days of the golden age of Hollywood comes Nazi regime in the bitchiest, most revealing memoir from one of its stars1930s. There are scores to be settled, stars to be insulted, secrets to be hinted at none too subtley, and lost opportunities to be longed for. OhFred, a sensitive and the star telling all? Wellthoughtful man, for those had some vague ideas of you who can't tell from "building bridges" which may guard against the title (or even growing hostilities between nations unfolding in Europe at the picture on the front cover) ittime. Fred's Cheeta - chimpanzee star of the Tarzan films.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007280165</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Philippe Auclair |title=Cantona: The Rebel Who Would Be King|rating=4|genre=Sport|summary=Even though Iattempts to separate individual people from ideology weren'm not a Manchester United fan, Eric Cantona is one of my all time favourite players t universally successful but he did make friendships and I was really excited to get the opportunity to read connections that lasted for a book which was billed as revealing his innermost thoughts, and being the definitive account of his careerlifetime.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230706347</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Alistair Duncan Will Brooker|title=Close to Holmes: A Look at the Connections Between Historical London, Sherlock Holmes and Sir Arthur Conan DoyleThe Truth About Lisa Jewell
|rating=5
|genre=Biography
|summary=Even todayMeet [[:Category:Lisa Jewell|Lisa Jewell]], one of the most successful British authors I've never knowingly read. Now meet Will Brooker, London is a remarkable compromise one of the thousands of less successful authors I quite confidently never have read. This book starts with the old two meeting each other, as well, and shows how 2021 drew the newtwo closer and closer together. As Alistair Duncan shows in this volumeThe meeting was some unspecified combination, it seems, of her anecdote about cup cakes, the city words of Conan Doyle her latest book she was reciting, and Holmes her being in a ''black lace mini-dress with gold brocade'' (certainly a get-up never commonly worn at the author events I get to attend), but pulled Brooker, a professor of cultural studies who has changed – yet not changedswallowed Roland Barthes, down the rabbit-hole that is Jewell's diverse output. There have been Brooker decides he'd like nothing more than to follow her through a handful of books year in the past on 'Holmespublished author's London'life, working to make a success of the latest title, and struggling with the next in line. Jewell, due diligence appropriately done, but agrees. And this is the first of its kind to place equal emphasis on places associated with the detective and his creatorresult.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1904312500</amazonuk>1529136024
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Paul R Spiring (Editor) Martha Leigh|title=Bobbles & PlumInvisible Ink: Four Satirical Playlets by Bertram Fletcher Robinson and PG WodehouseA Family Memoir|rating=5|genre=Biography|summary=P.G. Wodehouse needs little if any introduction, but Bertram Fletcher Robinson's life and career were cut short and he is little known outside his connections with Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. This set of satirical playlets on which they collaborated, published Martha Leigh begins her book talking about a childhood spent in journals between 1904 and 1907 and virtually forgotten sincea slightly eccentric, are presented in book form for the first timeimmediately recognisable upper middle class English family. As such they show how Her father is a Cambridge don, forever clacking away on his typewriter as he edits the careers complete correspondence of both men were evolvingthe philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau, particularly while Wodehouse was finding his feet and experimenting with life's work. Her mother is a concert pianist who practises for hours every day. Neither parent is hugely interested in the different facets practicalities of journalism before finding his niche life. There is love in comic fictionthe house but also darker undercurrents that a child does not fully understand but knows is there.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1904312586</amazonuk>1800460384
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Peter Wynter Bee and Lucy Clapham Polly Barton|title=People of the Day 4: The Rich and Famous CaricaturedFifty Sounds
|rating=4.5
|genre=BiographyPolitics and Society|summary=Have you ever Where do I start? I could start with where Barton herself starts, with the question ''Why Japan?'' Japan has been asked to buy a book in aid of on my radar for a charity while and wished that youif the world hadn'd given a donation and t gone into melt-down I would have visited by now. I may get there later this year, but I am not taken the book? Wellhopeful. And like Barton, if you have Idon'm hoping t know the answer to persuade you that there are exceptions to every rule and this book the question ''why Japan?'' She explains her feelings in aid respect of the Cystic Fibrosis Trust question in the first essay, which is definitely worth on the cover pricesound ''giro' '' – which she describes as being, among other things, the sound of ''every party where you have to introduce yourself''.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0954811038</amazonuk>1913097501
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jeremy Nicholas Frederic Gros|title=Idle Thoughts on Jerome K Jerome: A 150th Anniversary CelebrationPhilosophy of Walking|rating=4.5|genre=BiographyPolitics and Society|summary=Although he was a prolific novelist, short story writer, dramatist and journalist, Jerome Klapka Jerome will always be remembered first and foremost as I confess I picked this one up from the author library in my pre-lockdown forage of ''Three Men in a Boat''random stuff. This fascinating anthology, published on the 150th anniversary of his birth, reminds us Now I have to go out an buy my own copy so that there was far more to I can turn down the man than that one admittedly enduring book.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0956221203</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Richard D Ryder|title=Nelson, Hitler pages I have marked and Diana|rating=4|genre=Popular Science|summary=Was Horatio Nelson, a navy officer of great renown, forever thrusting himself into the limelight, doing it because his mother passed away return to its varying wisdom when he was nine? I need to. Some books draw you in slowly. Was Hitler overly affected by his father dying This one had me in a time of paternal disapproval, and a kind of Oedipal reaction to being the man in the house making him suffer when she herself died? And can Dianafirst two pages, Princess of Waleswherein Gros explains why ' parents' divorce lead to walking is not a claim she was a sufferer of borderline personality disorder?sport''.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1845401662</amazonuk>1781688370
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Trevor Hamilton Sharon Blackie|title=Immortal Longings: F.W.H. Myers and the Victorian Search for Life After Death|rating=4|genre=Biography |summary=Born in 1843, Frederic Myers began his career as a classical lecturer at Cambridge University, but disliked teaching and soon gave it up in favour of writing poetry and essays in literature. Although his social circle included men such as Gladstone, Ruskin, Tennyson, Browning and Prince Leopold, the most intellectual of Queen Victoria's sons, his books (which are not so well remembered today) might have been his sole claim to fame, had it not been for his passionate curiosity about the meaning of human life. If it had a purpose, he was convinced, it could only be discovered through the study of human experiences.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845401239</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Paul R Spiring (Editor) |title=The World of Vanity Fair - Bertram Fletcher RobinsonWomen Rose Rooted
|rating=5
|genre=Biography |summary=Every now and then, I normally say that you comes across can tell how much a really sumptuous book, where just turning and looking at the means to me by how many pages takes you into another worldhave corners turned down. Such Perhaps an even greater measure of impact is setting out to buy my own copy before I've finished reading the case with this one. ''Vanity Fair'' was a gentler Victorian forerunner of ''Private Eye'I've borrowed. Subtitled, I want to avoid clichés like 'powerful'A Weekly'inspiring' ''Show of Political, Social, and Literary Wares'', it appeared between 1868 and 1914. Like the more successful, longerlife-lasting changing''Punch'', – although it began with radical aspirations, intending ''to expose what'' [is definitely the editor] ''perceived to be the'' ''vanities of the elite social classes''. However its satire was gently humorous rather than malicious, and almost everybody who was portrayed in its pages was flattered.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1904312535</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Piers Dudgeon|title=Captivated: J.M. Barrie, the Du Mauriers and the Dark Side of Neverland|rating=3.5|genre=Biography |summary=According to D.H. Lawrence, J.M. Barrie ''has a fatal touch for those he loves. They die.'' Barrie had an extraordinary fascination with a childlike world of innocence and young boys who never grew up. Had it merely stopped at creating Peter Pan, all well first two and good. Unfortunately this obsession manifested itself in an unhealthy involvement with others, notably the du Maurier family.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099520451</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Emma Charles|title=How Could He Do It?|rating=4.5|genre=Autobiography|summary=Emma Charles was on only time will tell about the edge of thinking that she and her family were doing quite well. They were an ordinary family third – mum, dad, two daughters, three dogs, a rabbit and a couple of guinea pigs. Sprinkle in an Open University course but clichés exist for Mum, private schooling for the girls, a nice car in the drive of the nice house, good clothes reason and fun holidays – and you I'm not sure I can understand why she might be rather pleased with the way that life was going. Then her fifteen year old daughter, Tamsin, gave her a note, couched in graphic terms, saying that her father had been sexually abusing her for the past five years.In moments the family's life fell apart. Gone were all the certainties, the hopes and the expectations. In came the police, Social Services and Child Protection Officerssuccinctly put it any better.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1848090005</amazonuk>1912836017
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jacqueline Walker0241446732|title=Pilgrim StateOur House is on Fire: Scenes of a Family and a Planet in Crisis|author=Malena Ernman, Greta Thunberg, Beata Thunberg and Svante Thunberg
|rating=5
|genre=AutobiographyPolitics and Society|summary=I The Ernman / Thunberg family seemed perfectly normal. Malena Ernman was intrigued an opera singer and touched by Jacqueline Walker's beautiful memoir Svante Thunberg took on most of her childhood in Jamaica and London in the 1960'sparenting of their two daughters. This is a book inevitably compared Then eleven-year-old Greta stopped eating and talking and her sister, Beata, then nine years old, struggled with Andrea Levywhat was happening. In such circumstances, it's ''Small Island''. It follows similar groundnatural to seek a solution close to home, but eventually, it became clear to the main difference and great strength, is family that itthey were ''burned-out people on a burned-out planet''s the real narrative of mother and daughter. As If they were to find a girl I was familiar with areas of London where Jackie Walker lived and heard some members of my family denigrate Caribbean immigrantsway to live happily again their solution would need to be radical. From this memoir, I've garnered much about the lived experience of my less advantaged contemporaries.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340960809</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Kate Williams0648684806|title=Becoming QueenClara Colby: The International Suffragist|author=John Holliday
|rating=4
|genre=Biography
|summary=ItThe path of Clara Dorothy Bewick's a story which has been told by many authors during life was probably determined when her family emigrated to the last centuryUSA. The Victorian ageAt the time she was just three-years-old but because of some childhood ailment, she wasn't allowed to sail with her parents and three brothers. Instead, she remained with her grandparents, or at any rate the woman who gave doted on her name to the eraand saw that she received a good education, came about largely if not wholly because of a crisis both in and out of sorts among King George III's familyschool. By She was the time his seven surviving sons reached middle age, they had managed to produce one legitimate only child between them, namely Princess Charlottein the household and her childhood was glorious. Her unexpected deathBy contrast, and her family had become pioneer farmers in the need for at least some if not all mid-west of the others United States and life was hard, as Clara was to do their dynastic duty find out when she and produce an heir or two, resulted in an undignified mass scramble her grandparents eventually went to join the altarfamily. EdwardClara would only know her mother for a few months: she was married for fifteen years, had ten pregnancies, Duke of Kent won the lotteryseven surviving children and died in childbirth not long after Clara arrived. It As the eldest girl, a heavy burden would fall on Clara and Wisconsin was he and his wife, a widow with two small children by her first marriage, whose daughter Victoria became the saviour of the royal successionrude awakening.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099451824</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Martyn Downer1789017977|title=The QueenRonnie and Hilda's KnightRomance: Towards a New Life after World War II|author=Wendy Williams|rating=4|genre=History|summary=Ronnie Williams was the son of Thomas Henry Williams (known as Harry) and Ethel Wall.5 There's some doubt as to whether or not they were ever married or even Harry's birthdate: he claimed to have been born in 1863, but he was already many years older than Ethel and he might well have shaved a few years off his age. For a while, the family was quite well-to-do but disaster struck in the 1929 Depression and five-year-old Ronnie had to adjust to a very different lifestyle. One thing he did inherit from his father was his need to be well-turned-out and this would stay with him throughout his life. He joined the army at eighteen in 1942.}}{{Frontpage|author=Patti Smith|title=Year of the Monkey|rating=4
|genre=Biography
|summary=The title sounds more indicative On the coast of a novel by [[:Category:Dorothy Dunnett|Dorothy Dunnett]] or Jean Plaidy than a biography. Then a brief prologue starts Santa Cruz, Patti Smith enters the story at lunar year of the very endmonkey - one packed with mischief, when Queen Victoria receives the sorrow, and unexpected news of the death of Sir Howard Elphinstonemoments. An equally short first chapter gives us In a glimpse of the man some thirty years earlier in the thick of battle at the Crimea. Only after that do we stranger's words, 'reach' his birth in 1829. Sometimes rules are meant to be brokenAnything is possible: after all, and it's a good way the year of introducing this very interesting lifethe monkey''. As Smith wanders the husband coast of his subject's greatSanta Cruz in solitude, she reflects on a year that brings huge shifts in her life -greatloss and ageing are faced head-granddaughteron, as it the author is well qualified to write itshifting political waters in America.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>055215508X</amazonuk>1526614758
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=William Coxe and Peter Danckwerts (Editor)1912242052|title=Anecdotes of George Frederick Handel and John Christopher SmithO Joy for me!|author=Keir Davidson
|rating=3
|genre=BiographyArt|summary=Written by the stepson of John Christopher Smith (a friend of Handel and composer in his own right), ''AnecdotesOh Joy for me!''gives Coleridge credit for being ' is an overview of two men who in their own ways were remarkable. Handel, of course, was a musical genius while Smith was a man of great kindness — a good friend of Coxe's father, he married his widow to ensure she and her children would be cared for.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1904799396</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Barney Hoskyns|title=Lowside of the Road: A Life of Tom Waits|rating=4.5|genre=Biography|summary=Born and raised in Los Angeles, Tom Waits probably enjoys a status comparable first person to walk the UK's Richard Thompson. He has never sold out to a mass pop audiencemountains alone, preferring instead not because he had to sustain an engagingly low-key career for over 30 yearswork, feted by critics, fellow artists and as a cult following while only achieving modest record sales. While his 80s albums 'Swordfishtrombones' and 'Rain Dogs' are regarded as among the finest of the decademiner, most of his royalties have come through cover versions of his songs. Twoquarryman, 'Downtown Train' and 'Tom Traubert's Blues', have been Top 10 hits for Rod Stewart, who once said that they paid for the swimming pool in Tom's garden, while in his early days the Eagles gave him a boost by recording 'Ol' 55' on their third album.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0571235522</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Victor Schoelcher (Author)shepherd or pack-horse driver, Anton de Moresco (Editor), James Lowe (Translator) |title=The Life of Handel|rating=4|genre=Biography|summary=Although but because he is probably best remembered wanted to for his active role in the abolition of slavery in the French colonies, pleasure and as a campaigner for women's rights, Victor Schoelcher was also a noted musicologistadventure. His biography of the composer Handelrapturous encounters with their natural beauty, first published in 1857and its literary consequences, was one changed our view of the first scholarly works on the subject, and at the time it was generally regarded as one of the finest portraits of a musician or composer ever writtenworld''.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1904799388</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Iain McCalmanGraff_Find|title=Darwin's Armada: Four Voyagers to the Southern Oceans and Their Battle for the Theory of EvolutionFind Another Place|author=Ben Graff
|rating=3.5
|genre=BiographyAutobiography|summary=A look at DarwinWhen Ben Graff's journey on The Beaglegrandfather Martin handed him a plastic folder of handwritten notes from his journal, as well as journeys by Joseph Hookerhe didn't take much notice of it. At the age of 24, Thomas Huxley and Alfred Wallace. DarwinGraff didn's Armada provides a broad overview that strikes a different tone to other books in a crowded market. Casual readers who usually steer clear t realise the gravity of non-fiction will enjoy itthe pages he was holding.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184737266X</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Frances Osborne1789016304|title=The Bolter|rating=4|genre=Biography|summary=Life in London just after the Great War must have been jolly, even frightfully good fun, what – for the right (or the wrong?) people. The early 1920s were the years of the bright young things, the men who had been lucky enough to return from the fighting still in one piece, determined to make up for years of tedium in the trenches by whooping it up with the equally pleasure-loving gals barely out and Love: A family's testament of their teensanguish, just as willing to throw morals and discretion to the winds and party round the clock. This was the age when women thought nothing of receiving invited company while in the bath endurance and slowly getting dressed devotion in front of them. One hostess even greeted her guests walking down the staircase of her Belgrave Square mansion wearing a string of the family pearls – and nothing else.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1844084809</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewoccupied Amsterdam|author=Doris Kearns Goodwin|title=Team of RivalsMelanie Martin|rating=4.5
|genre=Biography
|summary=This hefty tomeMelanie Martin read about what happened to Dutch Jews in occupied Amsterdam during World War II and was entranced by what she discovered, the cover tells us, is particularly in ''The Diary of Ann Frank''the book but then realised that inspired Barack Obamaher own family's stories were equally fascinating. A hundred and seven thousand Jews were deported from the city during the war years, but only five thousand survived and Martin could not understand how this could be allowed to happen in a country with liberal values who were resistant to German occupation. For Most people believed that the occupation could never happen: even those who thought that the Germans might reach the city were convinced that they would soon be pushed back, that the Amsterdammers would never allow what happened to escalate in the way that it's worthdid, Obamabut initial protests melted away as the organisers became more circumspect. It's name appears no less than nine times an atrocity on the cover and spine, while Lincoln's appears only six, and that a vast scale but made up of tens of thousands of the author a mere twoindividual tragedies.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141043725</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=John Gribbin and Michael White1786893452|title=Darwin: A Life in ScienceThe Ungrateful Refugee|author=Dina Nayeri
|rating=4.5
|genre=Biography
|summary=This straightforward and likeable biography of Charles Darwin charts Here in the evolution West, we see news reports about immigrants on a regular basis – some media welcoming them, some scaremongering about them. But all of his theories of evolutionthose stories are written by journalists – almost always western, and almost always, while providing solid insights into no matter how deep the man in investigative journalism they carry out, outsiders to the context of his upbringing, education world and family lifethe situations that refugees find themselves in. Importantly, it makes you want to read It''On s rare that we find out the Origin of journeys from the Species''refugees themselves – and this is a rare opportunity to do that, acting as a primer for the ideas introduced in that famous volume. ''Darwin: A Life this intelligent, powerful and moving work by Dina Nayeri -someone who was born in Science'' is pitched beautifully for the reader middle of popular sciencea revolution in Iran, yet gives plenty of signposts enabling future study. It also gives fleeing to America as a very believable picture of Darwin, based on convincing evidence and without falling into florid psychological speculationten-year-old.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847391494</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Michael D Lemonick0857058320|title=The Georgian Star: How William Lord Of All the Dead|author=Javier Cercas and Caroline Herschel Revolutionized Our Understanding of the CosmosAnne McLean (translator)
|rating=4
|genre=Biography
|summary=No-one can ever look at ''Lord Of All the night skies above our heads as Galileo did. The light pollution covering so much of our planet makes it impossible Dead'' is a journey to see nearly as much as he mightuncover the author's lost ancestor's life and death. Conversely, he would have adored living Cercas is searching for the meaning behind his great uncle's death in a time such as ours – with the technology to show him so much he couldnSpanish Civil War. Manuel Mena, Cercas't seegreat uncle, so much he darenis the figure who looms large over the book. He died relatively young whilst fighting for Francisco Franco't dream s forces. Cercas ruminates on why his uncle fought for this dictator. The question at the centre ofthis book is whether it is possible for his great uncle to be a hero whilst having fought for the wrong side. Sitting happily between those two extremes was William Herschel.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>039306574X</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=David Grann1788037812|title=The Lost City Fraternity of Zthe Estranged: A Legendary British Explorer's Deadly Quest to Uncover the Secrets of the AmazonThe Fight for Homosexual Rights in England, 1891-1908|author=Brian Anderson
|rating=5
|genre=Biography
|summary=For Lieutenant-Colonel Percy Fawcett there was more to Originally passed in 1885, the Amazonian jungle than El Doradolaw that had made homosexual relations a crime remained in place for 82 years. His target was a treasure of a different nature – a lost city to be discovered because it was a cityBut during this time, restrictions on same-sex relationships did not for any spurious material wealth it might holdgo unchallenged. Could an entire civilisation have been founded in the inhospitable tracks of rain forest, Between 1891 and left remains he might find fame in locating? As this brilliant biography shows1908, Fawcett was three books on the best man around to find itnature of homosexuality appeared.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847374360</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Peter Wynter Bee and Lucy Clapham|title=People of the Day 3They were written by two homosexual men: The Rich Edward Carpenter and Famous Caricatured|rating=4|genre=Biography|summary=I often find myself paying money for books where John Addington Symonds, as well as the profits go to charity and I'm usually left with heterosexual Havelock Ellis. Exploring the feeling that I'd much rather someone had simply asked me for a donation margins of society and not wasted studying homosexuality was common on the paper. Every once European Continent, but barely talked about in a while a book comes along which proves me wrong and there's only one way to describe the ''People of UK, so the Day'' series. The books are a delight and it's all in aid publications of these men were hugely significant – contributing to the Cystic Fibrosis Trust.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>095481102X</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=John Matteson|title=Eden's Outcasts: The Story scientific understanding of Louisa May Alcott homosexuality, and Her Father |rating=4.5|genre=Biography|summary=Louisa May Alcott beginning the struggle for recognition and her fatherequality, Amos Bronson, shared leading to the milestone legalisation of same birthday, she being born on 29 November 1832, his thirty-third. Throughout their lives, father and daughter remained extraordinarily close, and even almost died together. When he finally succumbed after a stroke and long-drawn out illness on 4 March 1888, she was too ill to be told and followed him two days later. Between them, they saw life as 'a persistent but failed quest for perfection', regarding themselves sex relationships in their vain pursuit of paradise on earth as Eden's outcasts, hence the title of this dual biography1967.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0393333590</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Ranginui Walker Buckland_Zoo|title=Paki HarrisonThe Man Who Ate the Zoo: Tohunga Whakairo : the Story Frank Buckland, forgotten hero of a Master Carver natural history|author=Richard Girling
|rating=4.5
|genre=Biography
|summary=It was an inspired choice that Ranginui Walker was commissioned to write this book. He successfully places As a conservationist in Victorian England before the extraordinary character of master carver Paki Harrison into an historicalterm existed, cultural, academic and political context, whilst never letting us forget that this almost mythical genius is Frank Buckland was very much a man with ahead of his personal conflicts, successes and devotion.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0143010069</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Megan Hutching|title=Over the Wide and Trackless Sea: the Pioneer Women and Girls of New Zealand|rating=3.5|genre=Biography|summary=This book offers a valuable insight into the lives of twelve pioneer women who suffered, endured and triumphed in New Zealand. Their journey by boat from Europe to New Zealand was a long and sometimes perilous onetime. The European explorers had previously been certain that their destination existedSurgeon, mainly because they abhorred a vacuumnaturalist, veterinarian and couldn't believe there could be such a vast expanse of ocean without the existence of a great land. Some also believed that without a land mass south of the Tropic of Capricorn, the world would be tipped upside down, while others were fearful they would burn eccentric sums him up whilst crossing the equatorperfectly, and any biographer is immediately presented with a myth finally dispelled by the Portuguese voyaging around Africa.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1869507061</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Joanne Drayton|title=Ngaio Marsh: Her Life in Crime|rating=4|genre=Biography|summary=Joanne Drayton successfully introduces us colourful tale to the reclusive Ngaio Marsh, her extraordinary success, and her love for the theatre, the arts, her friends and the country she loved and would always call hometell.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1869506359</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Wendy KendallWilliams_Captain|title=Wind DrivenCaptain Ronald Campbell of Bombala Station, Cambalong: Barbara Kendall's StoryHis Military Life and Times|author=Ivor George Williams
|rating=4
|genre=Biography
|summary=Barbara Kendell is an extraordinary womanIn March 1829 Ann Parker married Captain J A Edwards of the 17th Regiment of Foot. He was in command of the troops and convicts on board a ship sailing from Plymouth to Sydney, Australia: his wife and young son accompanied him. She has He was not only won windsurfing medals at three Olympics, she is destined to live a motherlong life, an IOC representativedying suddenly at the age of 34 at Bangalore, public speaker and mentorleaving his widow to raise their two young sons. This biographyEdwards' death left his widow in a difficult position: not only did she have their farm to manage, written by her sister, tells but she was also responsible for the inspiring story of an extraordinary woman convicts who overcame her personal challenges and remains at worked the top of her sport after twenty land. Two years of competitionlater she would marry Captain Ronald Campbell.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>186979043X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Brian W Pugh and Paul R SpiringPeacock_mountain|title=Bertram Fletcher Robinson: A Footnote to Into The Hound of the Baskervilles |rating=3.5|genre=Biography|summary=Bertram Fletcher Robinson was a great friend of Arthur Conan Doyle and a prolific writerMountain, who tragically died aged just thirty-six in 1907. His collaboration was crucial to the revival A Life of Sherlock Holmes in ACD's best-known tale, ''The Hound of the Baskervilles''. This volume is described as a 'footnote' to that story and while there is much of value to Sherlock Holmes fans, I got little impression of BFR the man, despite the meticulously recorded details which the authors have painstakingly uncovered.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1904312403</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewNan Shepherd|author=George Johnson|title=The Ten Most Beautiful ExperimentsCharlotte Peacock|rating=4.5
|genre=Biography
|summary=''The Ten Most Beautiful Experiments'' looks at Mostly we choose what books to read because there is so little time and so many books… I can understand the most elegantapproach, stylishbut I also think we sell ourselves short by it, simpleand we sell the myriad lesser-known authors short as well. So while, ground-breakinglike most other people I have my favourite genres, thrilling and inspiring experiments throughout history. There's a real feel that this is how science should be done: one personfavoured authors, alone in a roomand while, forming a hypothesis like most other people I read the reviews and creating follow up on what appeals, I also have a method third-string to test it. It doubles as a potted biography of some of the greatest scientists ever, but it's more about the experiments themselves than the peoplemy reading bow: randomness.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224071963</amazonuk>
}}