Secondhand Biographies

In his New York Times bestselling memoir, A Work in Progress, Connor Franta shared his journey from small-town Midwestern boy to full-fledged Internet sensation. Exploring his past with humor and...

It is the late 1970s and Manjula Padmanabhan is in her mid-twenties trying to find her way in the world. Life in Bombay is proving tricky: there are the visits...

Most break-up bibles are full of the same old stories of woe, wrack and ruin...1. Crying into large glasses of Chardonnay2. A huge amount of retail therapy and some unwise...

In the summer of 1992, accompanied by Philip Marsden, the exiled poet Zofia Hinska stepped into the Belorussian village where she had spent her childhood. The Bronski House is in...

'An incredibly personal story...sad, but unbelievably funny' - Claudia Winkleman, BBC Radio 2 Arts Show'This memoir is gasp-out-loud, offensively funny, touching and a sure thing for anyone who likes David...

In 1984, when he was Deputy Chief Constable of Manchester, John Stalker was asked to go to Northern Ireland to investigate the alleged "shoot to kill" policy by RUC policemen...

The tough life of one of Britain's most senior policemen, who rose through the ranks from poverty and deprivation to the highest office, and went on to become Blair's 'Drug...

Set in 1970s Manchester, Once in a House on Fire tells the true story of three sisters and their mother, a close-knit and loving family forced to battle with poverty,...

A 2024 Book of the Year pick in the Economist, Independent, Prospect, Apollo, New Yorker and at WaterstonesA 2024 Summer Read in the Economist, Telegraph, Guardian, New Yorker, i, and...

An intimate portrait of an everyday genius. As Aristotle understood it, 'there is no great genius without a mixture of madness' and he may well have had a point: Einstein...

On 17th November, 2012, Salvador Alvarenga left the coast of Mexico for a two-day fishing trip. A vicious storm killed his engine and the current dragged his boat out to...

With the same sharp eye, quick wit and narrative drive that made The Game a bestseller, Neil Strauss takes us on a white-knuckle journey through America's heart of darkness as...

'Incredible. One of those rare books that should be dispensed on prescription to every household.' - Lucy Easthope, author of When the Dust Settles'Hilarious, bitter, poignant and profound . ....

Kate Adie's story is an unusual one. Raised in post-war Sunderland, where life was 'a sunny experience, full of meat-paste sandwiches and Sunday school', she has reported memorably and courageously...

When even his friends refer to him as 'a balding, bug-eyed opportunist with the looks of a beach ball, the charisma of a glove-puppet and an ego the size of...

Billionaire oil trader Marc Rich for the first time talks at length about his private life (including his expensive divorce from wife Denise); his invention of the spot oil market,...

As a small boy in Epping Forest, Jack Straw could never have imagined that one day he would become Britain's Lord Chancellor. As one of five children of divorced parents,...

Bear Grylls is a man who has always sought the ultimate in adventure. Growing up on the Isle of Wight, he was taught by his father to sail and climb...

A young girl is perched on the cold chrome of yet another doctor's examining table, missing yet another day of school. Just twelve, she's tall, skinny, and weak. It's four...

A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERFrom the National Book Award-winning author of Just Kids Selected as Book of the Year by the Daily Telegraph, i paper, Metro and Harper's Bazaar'Magical' GUARDIAN...

By the former Chairman of the Conservative Party and the last Governor of Hong Kong, this work offers an analysis of the Asian phenomenon and the future of economic and...

"It might be thought the height of poor taste to ascribe good fortune to a healthy man with a young family struck down at the age of sixty by an...

William Woodruff had the sort of childhood satirised in the famous Monty Python Yorkshireman sketch. The son of a weaver, he was born on a pallet of straw at the...

For years, Jenny and sister Kim suffered horrendous physical and sexual abuse at the hands of their father. They survived in part because of their closeness and their determination to...

'Remarkable . . . Infidel shows that a determined woman can change more history than her own' Christopher Hitchens, Sunday Times 'If there is one book that really addresses the...

"I immersed myself in magic. I read every book I could get my hands on and practised and practised, day after day and night after night. Magic became my world...some...

Heartwarming, compelling and genuinely remarkable, More Than Just Coincidence is the true story of a mother who was reunited with her daughter, twenty years after she gave her up for...

Assam, 1925. James MacDonald is one of the sons of empire who has no yearning for England. Running a tea plantation, he loves India and is reluctant to choose a...

'The political memoir of the decade' Sunday Times The referendum on Britain's membership of the EU is one of the most controversial political events of our times. For the first...

"A renegade Florence Nightingale cares for the ill in a remarkable tale of compassion and combating prejudice" The Guardian 'Breath-taking courage and compassion [...]a beautiful book' The Sunday Times'An extraordinary...

How do you learn to live again when you've danced with death?Louise's road to having a baby was far from easy, suffering a heartbreaking miscarriage during her first pregnancy and...

The true story of a Romany childhood... Gypsy Princess is a searingly honest account of what life is really like for travelling communities, for girls in particular, and captures a...

Everyone knows that Lord Sugar has strong opinions and is not afraid to voice them - no matter how controversial they may be. His bestselling autobiography revealed his incredible rags...

Rich with humour, insight, compassion - and absolute honesty - Tiny Beautiful Things is a balm for everything life throws our way, administered by the author of the New York...

James Herriot's stories about his life as a vet in Yorkshire have charmed and delighted millions of readers in the twenty years since his first book If Only They Could...

For Patrick Melrose, `family' is more than a double-edged sword. As friends, relations and foes trickle in to pay final respects to his mother, Eleanor - an heiress who forsook...

Welcome to the life of Dr Max Skittle. Therapist, relationship counsellor, social worker, friend, parent-figure - and, yes: doctor.Join Max - and his patients - as he takes us on...

'Please help me,' he said in a small voice. 'Will you help me?'Six-year-old Ralph has only been in the care system for three days and has already been rejected by...

The diary of Jean-Dominique Bauby who, with his left eyelid (the only surviving muscle after a massive stroke) dictated a remarkable book about his experiences locked inside his body. A...

**THE NUMBER ONE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER** **WINNER OF THE 2010 COSTA BIOGRAPHY AWARD** 264 wood and ivory carvings, none of them bigger than a matchbox: Edmund de Waal was entranced...