News Blog @ Wellington City Libraries

Once again Britain is home to many of this month’s picks. They range from singer Rod Stewart, writers Martin Amis, Oscar Wilde and Daphne du Maurier to those who chose to live in that country and are now associated with her, such as Karl Marx and the Americans Nancy Astor and Sylvia Plath.  Stories of six women who made new lives in America are also included in this month’s complement along with an entrepreneurial Kiwi engineer, who invented the electric fence among many other useful things, is celebrated in a new biography.

Something for everybody !! Enjoy this month’s selection.

Martin Amis : the biography / Richard Bradford.
“Martin Amis’s life could itself provide the formula for an enthralling work of fiction. Son of one of the most popular and best-loved novelists of the post-War era, he has forged a groundbreaking manner of writing that owes nothing to the style of his father, nor indeed to anyone else. He relished and recorded the bizarre, turbulent atmosphere of Britain and the US during the 1970s and 80s, arguably the transformative period of the late 20th century. No other contemporary writer has proved so magnetic for the popular press: he has, despite himself, achieved celebrity status. Of late, his reputation as a novelist has been matched by his outspoken, challenging writing on contemporary global politics, and he has earned the status as the Orwell of the early 21st century.” ( Summary from www.globalbooksinprint.com).

O my America! : second acts in a new world / Sara Wheeler.
“After reckoning with the ends of the earth in acclaimed books such as Terra Incognita and The Magnetic North, Sara Wheeler rediscovered America thirty-five years after her first Greyhound trip across the country. She returns in turbulent midlife to trace the steps of six women who fled various sorts of trouble in nineteenth-century England and went to the United States to reinvent themselves. Her travel companions include Fanny Trollope, mother of Anthony and author of the biting Domestic Manners of the Americans; the actress Fanny Kemble, who shocked the nation with her passionate first-hand indictment of slavery; the prolifically pamphleteering economist Harriet Martineau; the homesteader Rebecca Burlend, who had never been more than twelve miles from her Yorkshire village before she sailed to the New World; the traveller Isabella Bird, whose many ailments remained in check as long as she was scaling the Rockies; and the novelist Catherine Hubback, niece of Jane Austen, who deposited her husband in a madhouse and rode the brand-new rails to San Francisco.”(Summary from www.amazon.co.uk).

Mad girl’s love song : Sylvia Plath and life before Ted / Andrew Wilson.
“To curtail fears that this latest Plath biography forges already blatant connections between her work and her torrid inner life or her relationship with Ted Hughes, be assured, it is something altogether new. Wilson (Beautiful Shadow) fulfills his title’s promise, divulging her impressive string of romances, love-hate relationship with her mother, and “vampiric” interactions with those close to her, among other atypical and unconventional issues. While the significance of some seemingly frivolous details may appear momentous, it’s refreshing that Wilson does not make Plath’s suicide his focus, just as he examines her earlier, formative publications in magazines such Seventeen, Mademoiselle, and Ladies Home Journal as often-if not more so-as he does her better.’(Wellington City Libraries catalogue note).

Proust’s overcoat / Lorenza Foschini ; translated by Eric Karpeles.
“In the tradition of “The Professor and the Madman” comes the charming, intriguing story of one man’s obsessive search for the personal effects of legendary author Marcel Proust.” (Syndetics summary)

Ceremonies of bravery : Oscar Wilde, Carlos Blacker, and the Dreyfus Affair / J. Robert Maguire.
‘”Ceremonies of Bravery’ is a study of the friendship between the prolific writer Oscar Wilde and Carlos Blacker. The two men met in the 1880s, the period when Wilde was judged by many to be at his best, and Blacker went on to become a trustee of Wilde’s marriage settlement”.(Syndetics summary).

Levels of life / Julian Barnes.
“‘You put together two things that have not been put together before. And the world is changed…’ Julian Barnes’ new book is about ballooning, photography, love and grief; about putting two things, and two people, together, and about tearing them apart. One of the judges who awarded him the 2011 Man Booker Prize described him as ‘an unparalleled magus of the heart’. This book confirms that opinion”.
(Syndetics summary)

Nancy : the story of Lady Astor / Adrian Fort.
“In 1919, Nancy Astor became the first woman to be elected to Parliament. She was not what had been expected. Far from a virago who had suffered for the cause of female suffrage, she was already near the centre of the ruling society that had for so long resisted the political upheavals of the early twentieth century, having married into the family of one of the richest men in the world. She was not even British. She would prove to be a trailblazer and beacon for the generations of women who would follow her into Parliament. This new biography charts Nancy Astor’s incredible story, from penury in the American South, to a lifestyle of the most immense riches, from the luxury of Edwardian England, through the ‘Jazz Age’, and on towards the Second World War: a world of great country estates, lavish town houses and the most sumptuous entertainments, peopled by the most famous and powerful names of the age. But hers was not only the life of power, glamour and easy charm: it was also defined by principles and bravery, by war and sacrifice, by love and bitter disputes.
With glorious, page-turning brio, Adrian Fort has brought to life this restless, controversial American dynamo, an unforgettable woman who left a deep and lasting imprint on the political life of our nation”. (Syndetics summary)

Daphne du Maurier and her sisters : the hidden lives of Piffy, Bird and Bing / Jane Dunn.
“The Du Mauriers — three beautiful, successful and rebellious sisters. Much has been written about Daphne but here the hidden lives of the sisters are revealed in a riveting group biography.’ (Wellington City Libraries catalogue note).

Karl Marx : a nineteenth-century life / Jonathan Sperber.
“Returning Marx to the Victorian confines of the nineteenth century, Jonathan Sperber, one of the United States’ leading European historians, challenges many of our misconceptions of this political firebrand turned London émigré journalist. In this deeply humanizing portrait, Marx no longer is the Olympian soothsayer, divining the dialectical imperatives of human history, but a scholar-activist whose revolutionary Weltanschauung was closer to Robespierre’s than to those of twentieth-century Marxists.” (Syndetics summary)

Legend : from electric fences to global success : the Sir William Gallagher story / Paul Goldsmith.“The story of New Zealand’s most successful exporter and its head, Bill Gallagher, who built on the invention of an electric fence to make the company a world leader in its field. New Zealanders are always being exhorted to take a clever idea and go global. Easier said than done. But one iconic company has been doing just that for over 75 years. Gallagher Industries began in a Hamilton shed in the late 1930s, when a self-taught engineer, Bill Gallagher, came up with a design for an electric fence that transformed New Zealand farming. His sons Bill junior and John took over the business in the 1970s and applied their engineering genius and driving ambition to turn it into one of this country’s most successful companies. Today it employs 600 staff in New Zealand and has distributes its animal containment and security products worldwide.” ( Summary from www.globalbooksinprint.com).

Rod : the autobiography / [Rod Stewart].
“Rod Stewart was born working-class son of a Scottish plumber in North London. He was never, as some stories later had it, a professional footballer or a gravedigger, though he did become a bit of a singer – and a fairly good one at that. This book tells the story of a guy with one hell of a voice and one hell of a head of hair”.(Syndetics summary).

Now that America’s first black president is serving his second term of office it is hard to realise that half a century ago a humble Afro-American seamstress in the south of the country made history by refusing to give up her seat to a white man in a segregated bus. By so doing she started a revolution. This month we salute brave Rosa Parks.
Many of this month’s picks focus on people who have bettered the lives of others – such as Charles Dickens in highlighting the horrors of London workhouses, who earned their living by serving others such as the domestic servants featured here, or who lived life on the margins.

Lord of the isle : the extravagant life and times of Colin Tennant / Nicholas Courtney.
“This is the biography of the late Lord Glenconner, the lord born to a rich Victorian industrial family who used his wealth to live an eccentric lifestyle of self-indulgence from the 1940s to his death in 2010.”(www.globalbooksinprint.com)

Drinking with men / Rosie Schaap.
“Drinking memoirs generally fall into two categories: Never again and Pour me another. Schaap, who writes the Drink column for the New York Times Magazine, has composed one of the latter, an ode to the great tradition of regularhood advocating equal regularhood rights for women. From her teenage discovery of the bar car on the Metro-North New Haven Line; to her college years at the Pig, in North Bennington, Vermont; to a marriage-ending epiphany at Else’s, in Montreal, Schaap charts her path from adolescence to adulthood, bar by bar, sometimes having a few too many but always finding the sense of community and belonging she clearly craves.”(Provided by publisher).

Dickens and the workhouse : Oliver Twist and the London poor / Ruth Richardson.
“Medical historian Richardson (The Making of Mr. Gray’s Anatomy) joined the cause to preserve a London building that had once been the Strand Union Workhouse (as the British say) Cleveland Street. She made what she calls “the remarkable finding” that Dickens lived only a few doors away as a toddler and again in his late teens. Never mind that Dickens’s London addresses have long been known and that he placed the Oliver Twist workhouse 75 miles north of London (an area he visited where there was a workhouse)-Richardson wants to make the case for this workhouse as the basis for the famous workhouse scenes in Oliver Twist. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.” (Library Journal)

The rebellious life of Mrs. Rosa Parks / Jeanne Theoharis.
“In her introduction to this biography, Brooklyn College political scientist Theoharis (coauthor of Freedom North: Black Freedom Struggles Outside of the South) notes the common perception of Rosa Parks (1913-2005): “hidden in plain sight, celebrated and paradoxically relegated to be a hero for children.” Into that gap, Theoharis submits a lavishly well-documented study of Parks’s life and career as an activist. In tracing her work with the Montgomery NAACP and other groups from the 1930s onwards, and then following her move from Alabama after the 1956 bus boycott to Detroit, Theoharis maps a lifetime devoted to civil rights, thereby destabilizing our notions of Parks as a “tired seamstress” who simply kept her seat on a bus one day in 1955.(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved” (Publisher Weekly).

Outsiders : stories from the fringe of New Zealand society / Gerard Hindmarsh.
“A social history of New Zealand’s outsiders, such as Arawata Bill, The Chaffeys, George Wilder and others – those who choose to live out on the fringes of society, and whose free and unrestricted lives offer an important counterbalance to the structured urban world most of us inhabit”.(Syndetics summary).

The real Jane Austen : a life in small things / Paula Byrne.
“Just in time for the 200th anniversary of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice (first published in January 1813), comes Paula Byrne’s vivacious new portrait of its author. The approach Byrne (Jane Austen and the Theatre) takes is refreshingly material-based and the book is experimental in structure; each chapter unfolds from the biographer’s description of a small object associated with Austen’s life (chapter titles include “The East Indian Shawl”, “The Cocked Hat” “The Card of Lace”, “The Crimson Velvet Cushions”, and “The Topaz Crosses”). This technique serves two functions: firstly, it honors the precision for which Austen was famed by drawing attention to the material artifacts of her life; secondly, it challenges the “`official’ family biography”". (Publisher Weekly).

Rose : my life in service to Lady Astor / Rosina Harrison.
“Provides the author’s account of working as the personal maid for the American-born Lady Astor.”In 1928, Rosina Harrison arrived at the illustrious household of the Astor family to take up her new position as personal maid to the infamously unconventional Lady Astor, who sat in Parliament, entertained royalty, and traveled the world. Here, in Rose: My Life in Service to Lady Astor, Harrison shares with listeners her fascinating story.”(Summary from www.globalbooksinprint.com)

Climbing the stairs / Margaret Powell.
“Margaret Powell was born in 1907 in Hove, and left school at the age of 13 to start working. At 14, she got a job in a hotel laundry room, and a year later went into service as a kitchen maid, eventually progressing to the position of cook, before marrying a milkman called Albert. In 1968 the first volume of her memoirs, Below Stairs, was published to instant success and turned her into a celebrity. She followed this up with Climbing the Stairs, The Treasure Upstairs and The Margaret Powell Cookery Book. She died in 1984.”(Summary from www/globalbooksinprint.com).

Literary outlaw : the life and times of William S. Burroughs / Ted Morgan.
“Another dazzling literary portrait from the author of Maugham [BKL F 15 80]. This time Morgan has chosen a subject whose life and work are so inextricable that, unlike the effort required to unravel Maugham’s attempts to disguise his real nature, what is required here is a candor and openness to match the subject’s notoriety and vulnerability. A homosexual and drug addict, Burroughs pursued an individual course in his life and art with a purpose and intensity that would set him apart from other members of the countercultural circle that he helped make famous– let alone from more orthodox intellectual and artistic circles.Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.” (Booklist).

On Helwig Street : a memoir / Richard Russo.
“In its heyday Gloversville, New York was a prosperous beacon of the leather-goods industry, famously producing nine out of ten pairs of American gloves. But by the time Richard Russo was growing up there in the 1950s, the only son of a largely absent father and a mother, Jean, who suffered from ‘nerves’, Gloversville had fallen victim to changing fashions and gone bust. A better life elsewhere was the dream Jean instilled in her son and strived to secure for them both. Vividly recalling the road trips and adventures that took them far from Gloversville but always led them back home, Russo describes how childhood segued into adulthood and parenthood in the company of his restless mother. At the same time he recounts with touching honesty how the literary success that enriched his own life was at odds with the disappointment that punctuated hers.” (Summary from www.globalbooksinprint.com).

ALSO RELEVANT

Mrs Woolf and the servants / Alison Light.
“An authoritative, detailed account of the dynamic relationship between Virginia Woolf and the domestic help that was so crucial to her existence as a woman and a writer. Alison Light is clear-eyed and wise about her chosen topic. She has not only done her research, but brings to her task some unique advantages: Her grandmother was in domestic service. And indeed a particular feature of “Mrs. Woolf and the Servants” is its emphasis on the humanity of these women. Although well-versed in and informed by the sociological background, Ms. Light is careful to present rounded portraits of these people who played such an important role in the Woolf household.” —Washington Times

AND A GOOD ONE YOU MIGHT HAVE MISSED

What the grown-ups were doing : an odyssey through 1950s suburbia / Michele Hanson.
“Michele Hanson grew up an ‘oddball tomboy disappointment’ in a Jewish family in Ruislip in the 1950s – a suburban, Metroland idyll of neat lawns, bridge parties and Martini socials. This hilarious and wonderfully evocative memoir charts Michele’s childhood and coming of age in a Britain that was emerging from post-war austerity.”(Summary from www.globalbooksinprint.com).

Scarlett O’Hara is probably one of the best -known heroines in modern fiction.What is less well-known is that the author’s life was almost as tumultuous as that of her fictional creation.. Mitchell’s life mirrored Scarlett’s in that she rejected a conventional suitor and chose a wild outsider instead. But unlike Scarlett she was given a second chance, and that union gave birth to ‘Gone with the wind’.
Two other books selected this month feature second chances. Many will have seen the moving French film ” The Intouchables“.- ‘A second wind’ is the true story behind it. Phillipe Pozzi de Borgo was a wealthy champagne magnate who became a quadraplegic after a hang-gliding accident. Abdel was the tough, streetwise Algerian immigrant who reluctantly became his carer. His bucaneering approach to life gave fun and freedom to Philippe and ultimately helped him to find his life partner. In a neat juxtaposition looking after Philippe led to a new life for Abdel.
Award-winning writer Elie Weisel was given the gift of a new life after heart surgery. In “Open heart’ he reflects on his life – his successes and dispappointments and his hope that he had made the world a better place.

Wives and stunners : the Pre-Raphaelites and their muses / Henrietta Garnett.
“Essentially a domestic biography whose main concern is the tragicomedy of manners enacted by a closely knit group of friends and lovers,’ Wives and Stunners’ tells the story of Janey Morris, Georgie Burne-Jones, Lizzie Siddall, Effie Gray and–less well-known–Marie Spartali, Aglaia Coronio and Mary Zambacco.” (Syndetics summary).

Margaret Mitchell & John Marsh : the love story behind Gone with the wind / a biography by Marianne Walker.
“Margaret Mitchell (1900-1949), author of Gone With the Wind , jilted her kind, protective suitor, John Marsh, and instead married Red Upshaw, an unstable bootlegger who physically abused her. Even after she divorced Upshaw, Mitchell, according to Walker, was a confused romantic who in many ways resembled her heroine, Scarlett O’Hara. A “classic demanding-dependent personality,” Mitchell found more than a supportive fatherly mate in public relations executive Marsh, whom she finally married in 1925. Walker, a professor of English and philosophy at the University of Kentucky-Henderson Community College, reveals that Marsh played a vital role in the creation of Mitchell’s classic Civil War saga. He offered key ideas and advice, continuously edited the manuscript as his wife wrote it, and helped with the revision. Walker quotes liberally from the couple’s letters and also draws on interviews, family papers and archival research to tell a moving love story of a symbiotic union that lasted 24 years. A remarkable piece of detective work.” (Summary from www.globalbooksinprint.com).

Beryl Bainbridge : artist, writer, friend / Psiche Hughes.
“This book is a highly personal, chronological account of Beryls life and work both her writing and her painting and provides a vivid first-hand portrait of this free-spirited and uniquely talented woman. Beryl Bainbridge is best known as a prolific writer of novels that ranged from black comedies of contemporary life, often autobiographical in inspiration, to idiosyncratic reimaginings of historical events and characters. Less well known is that painting and drawing were also lifelong passions, and a source of income too in the days before her success as a writer. Most of all she painted people friends, lovers, her children, invented characters, characters from her novels, or historical figures (she had a particular fascination for Napoleon). She had no formal training, but developed an exuberance of technique to match her imagination.” (Summary from www.globalbooksinprint.com).

A second wind / Philippe Pozzo di Borgo ; translated by Will Hobson.
“Philippe Pozzo di Borgo was not in the habit of asking for help. Then, in 1993, a paragliding accident left him a quadriplegic. The only person who wasn’t bothered by Philippe’s condition was Abdel, the unemployed Algerian immigrant from the outskirts of society who would become Philippe’s unlikely caretaker.”(Syndetics summary).

“The summer my father died / Yudit Kiss ; translated from Hungarian by George Szirtes.
“This is a warm, graceful and poignant account of a daughter’s journey to understand her father, as well as the generation that grew up in socialist Hungary.”(Summary from www.globalbooksinprint.com).

Open heart / Elie Wiesel ; translated by Marion Wiesel.
“A profoundly and unexpectedly intimate, deeply affecting summing up of his life so far, from one of the most cherished moral voices of our time. Eighty-two years old, facing emergency heart surgery and his own mortality, Elie Wiesel reflects back on his life. Emotions, images, faces and questions flash through his mind. His family before and during the unspeakable Event. The gifts of marriage and children and grandchildren that followed. In his writing, in his teaching, in his public life, has he done enough for memory and the survivors? His ongoing questioning of God—where has it led? Is there hope for mankind? The world’s tireless ambassador of tolerance and justice has given us this luminous account of hope and despair, an exploration of the love, regrets and abiding faith of a remarkable.”(Summary from www.globalbooksinprint.com).

William Colenso : printer, missionary, botanist, explorer, politician : his life and journeys / by A.G. Bagnall and G.C. Petersen ; [edited by Ian St George].
“Colenso, a Church Missionary Society missionary, printer and botanist, established the first printing press in New Zealand and printed the first book, 5000 copies of the New Testament in Māori, in 1837. He also printed the Treaty of Waitangi. His Authentic and genuine history of the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi (1890) is regarded as the most reliable European account from the time. Throughout his life, he defended the rights and equality of Māori. Posted to Hawke’s Bay and determined to expand the activities of the mission, Colenso undertook major journeys to reach isolated Māori villages on the east coast of the North Island and inland.” (Syndetics summary).

Nancy : the story of Lady Astor / Adrian Fort.
“In 1919, Nancy Astor became the first female MP elected to the House of Commons. She was not what had been expected – or rather, in some quarters, feared. Far from a virago who had suffered for the cause of female suffrage, Nancy Astor was already near the centre of the ruling society that had for so long resisted the political upheavals of the early twentieth century, having married into the family of one of the richest men in the world. She wasn’t even British, but the daughter of a famous Virginian family, and fiercely proud of her expatriate ancestry. But her moral drive was strong, and she would utilise her position of extraordinary privilege and influence to blow a bracing American wind into what she regarded as the stuffy corners of British politics”(Summary from www.globalbooksinprint.com).

Moranthology / Caitlin Moran.
“British journalist Moran’s (How To Be a Woman) award-winning columns for The Times are available here for an American audience for the first time. In the introduction, she declares her intentions to write “a collection of instances of how brilliant the world often is.” To that end, she covers topics that range from her personal history (being homeschooled in a housing project in the industrial city of Wolverhampton, her work interviewing musicians including Keith Richards and Lady Gaga), social issues (benefit reform, the welfare state, the importance of libraries, particularly to poor communities; she describes them as places “where the wealthy’s taxes pay for you to become a little more extraordinary”. (Summary from www.globalbooksinnprint.com).

The pinecone : the story of Sarah Losh, forgotten romantic heroine, antiquarian, architect and visionary / Jenny Uglow.
“*Starred Review* Uglow takes such delight in her work that every page shimmers and whirls. On a mission to rescue neglected, radical English artists, such as Thomas Bewick (Nature’s Engraver, 2007), she now richly and inquisitively portrays brainy and independent Sarah Losh (1786-1853). Uglow grew up in Cumbria, Losh’s home territory, and knows well the wildly unconventional church Losh designed and built in the village of Wreay, a house of worship brimming with imagery drawn from Greek, Roman, Egyptian, Hindu, and Buddhist traditions, all shaped by Losh’s passion for fossils and science. Losh even helped craft the carved stone and wood vines, lotus flowers, dragon, butterflies*(–Seaman, Donna Copyright 2010 Booklist.From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission).(Syndetics summary)

Happy New Year to biography-lovers everywhere !! We have a great crop of new books for your delight and delectation, including a lovely new memoir by Grace Coddington of The September Issue fame. We have also received important new works on Stamford Raffles of Singapore, Robespierre, the love life of Charles Dickens and a book about Louisa May Alcott which focuses on her relationship with her very remarkable mother.
‘Meme : the three worlds of a Chinese – Italian New Zealander” is a book with local appeal. We quickly forget what our country was like in the 1950s – Meme Churton was a woman who brought sophistication and charm to our rather provincial lives. Something for everyone!! Happy reading.

Grace : a memoir / Grace Coddington with Michael Roberts.
“Coddington, creative director of the American Vogue magazine, has much to impart (which she has done before in Grace: 30 Years of Fashion at Vogue, 2002, and The Catwalk Cats, 2008). Fashionistas, rejoice, because not only does she chronicle the life and times of a former model turned editor; she also discusses those whose names appear in any celebrity column photographers such as Annie Leibovitz and Bruce Weber, models like Naomi Campbell, and the Calvin Klein and French couture maitres. What saves this from becoming a download of the activities of the rich and famous is, first, her amazing candor”.(Booklist).

Charles Dickens in love / Robert Garnett.
“*Starred Review* Four graves mark the conclusion of Garnett’s probing bioliterary study: the famous tomb of Charles Dickens’ in Westminster Abbey and the largely forgotten graves of three women who forever left their mark on Dickens’ books. The influence of these women indeed validates the judgment of an American visitor to the author: A man must have really loved a woman if he would fully interpret the secrets of a woman’s heart. The first of the women Dickens really loved, Maria Beadnell, spurned Dickens’ youthful advances yet impressed upon his imagination the lineaments of Estella in Great Expectations. The second female inspiration in Dickens’ life, Mary Hogarth Dickens’ sister-in-law died young, in Dickens’ arms. Her saintly image shines forth in Agnes in David Copperfield. But Garnett devotes his most sustained inquiry to the love” (Booklist).

The watchmaker’s daughter / Sonia Taitz.
“From the time Taitz was small, her parents’ stories about the Holocaust were like telling me about the secrets of the cosmos. Parts of this refugee family’s dynamics were competitions about which parent’s family had suffered most my life was worse than yours . . . you don’t know from suffering and, more happily, affection. When Sonia’s adored father pulled her toward him, my joy was boundless I had been – selected.’ Only then, chosen, did I feel fully alive. Her Jewish home, where even the walls were sighing, makes her eager for an outside world and education. She realizes, however, that her promised land is not Yale Law School, and finally becomes her own true self while studying literature at Oxford”.(Booklist)

Raffles and the golden opportunity 1781-1826 / Victoria Glendinning.
“This is the first biography in decades of the ‘Father of Singapore’. Thomas Stamford Raffles (1781-1826) was the charismatic and persuasive founder of Singapore and Governor of Java. An English adventurer, disobedient employee of the East India Company, utopian imperialist, linguist, zoologist and civil servant, he carved an extraordinary (though brief) life for himself in South East Asia. The tropical, disease-ridden settings of his story are as dramatic as his own trajectory – an obscure young man with no advantages other than talent and obsessive drive, who changed history by establishing – without authority – on the wretchedly unpromising island of Singapore, a settlement which has become a world city”.(Wellington City Libraries’ catalogue note).

Robespierre : a revolutionary life / Peter McPhee.
“Historian and professor McPhee (Living the French Revolution, 1789-1799) adds to his volumes on French history with a comprehensive biography of the controversial, diminutive, outspoken, and ambitious man who overcame adversity to become a lawyer, who argued for the rights of children born out of wedlock and freedom of the press in 18th-century France, and whose name is inextricably linked with the French Revolution-for better or worse. McPhee maintains that Maximilien Robespierre “was seeking to make sense of the chaos of a world in revolutionary upheaval and to use his talents to create stability and certainty for a new order”-but at the end of his short life, he was “reviled as thoroughly as he had once been idolized.” (Book jacket).

The road from Morocco : a memoir / Wafa Faith Hallam.
“The true story of Saadia, a thirteen-year-old Arab girl wed against her will in a Morocco divided between French and Arab traditional cultures. Her struggle to win a divorce and pursue her independence paves the way for her children to leave for America. Wafa, her oldest daughter, thrives in male-dominated Wall Street until she discovers the land of freedom and opportunity does not shield them from a tragic destiny. A string of events, including a violent marriage, mental illness, the 9/11 terrorist attack, and the Iraq war, conspire to bring about Wafa’s emotional breakdown followed by the end of her career. At last, the redemptive power of a newfound spirituality transforms Wafa’s life as seen in this literary memoir that reads like a compelling novel”.(Wellington City Libraries catalogue note).

Memé : the three worlds of an Italian-Chinese New Zealander / Memé Churton.
“Memé is half-Italian and half-Chinese and this unusual combination has coloured her personality and the course of her life. Growing up in Italy, she lived through the rise of Fascism and the Second World War. Next she went to China and found herself in the midst of the Chinese Revolution. Then she travelled to the other side of the world at the invitation of a New Zealand soldier whom she had met at the end of the war. Memé was shocked by the curiously old-fashioned and provincial way of life she found in 1950s New Zealand, but for various reasons she stayed, got married, and became involved in a variety of campaigns to enlarge its culture. She managed one of the first dealer art galleries, started one of its first European-style coffee bars, championed international cuisine, promoted fashion for women.”(Publisher Weekly).

Marmee & Louisa : the untold story of Louisa May Alcott and her mother / Eve LaPlante.
“*Starred Review* It’s not unusual for a biography to include a family tree, but it’s rare for the biographer to appear on it. LaPlante (Salem Witch Judge, 2007) is great-niece and cousin of the subjects of this involving mother-daughter portrait of Abigail May and Louisa May Alcott. Louisa’s unconventional father, Bronson, has received far more attention than his long-suffering, feminist wife, even though Abigail is the model for Marmee, the beloved mother in Little Women. This imbalance was due, in part, to Bronson’s burning of Abigail’s personal papers. But LaPlante discovered that all was not lost while examining the contents of her mother’s attic. Her subsequent quest for more overlooked materials resulted in this first full biography of Abigail; a collection of her writings (My Heart Is Boundless) and a fresh perspective on Louisa”.(Booklist).

An extraordinary theory of objects : a memoir of an outsider in Paris / Stephanie LaCava ; with illustrations by Matthew Nelson.
“Fashion writer Lavaca’s childhood and teenage years were strange and confounding. The author’s family moved from New York to a Parisian suburb in 1993 when she was 12; the next year she suffered a breakdown. Always considered a bit strange as a child, she found solace and a sense of order in collecting objects. She had a passion for ancient mythologies: “I was obsessed with cabinets of curiosities, historical efforts to catalog and control nature’s oddities,” Lacava writes. As an adult Lacava began looking back over her life “through a narrative illuminated with objects and their respective stories.”(Publisher Weekly).

Life is a gift : the zen of Bennett / Tony Bennett ; foreword by Mitch Albom.
“Relaxed and comfortable but full of vigor, Bennett’s voice has charmed audiences for more than 60 years. Writing in the same style as he sings, in this new work he shares meditative lessons culled from his amazing life. Having learned the value of hard work during the Great Depression, the pointlessness of war during WWII, and the importance of being true to yourself during a career that has seen musical fads come and go over and over, Bennett (The Good Life, with Will Friedwald) has developed a loose set of rules by which he lives. Whether he is suggesting people “Only Sing Good Songs” or “Everything Should be Done with Love,” Bennett explains how these tenets have shaped his success and makes suggestions about how others can apply them to their lives”. (Publisher Weekly).

The varnished untruth : my story / Pamela Stephenson.
“This is the autobiography of Pamela Stephenson, the wife of Billy Connelly and renowned writer and actress in her own right.”I am darn good at getting under other people’s skin, but opening up about my own life is quite a different matter. So how shall I portray myself? There are choices, you know: Wife, mother, psychologist, writer, comedian, actor, dancer, diver, gypsy, dreamer, rich girl, poor girl, beggar girl, thief. I am all of those and more. Tell you what, you decide. You decide exactly what I am.” A complicated childhood in Australia, a bold move to London, being a woman in a man’s world on Not the Nine O’Clock News, becoming Mrs Billy Connolly, motherhood, career changes and then Strictly Come Dancing – told in her own inimitable style”.(Wellington City Libraries catalogue note).

The phrase ” good British biography’ has a certain resonance and most biography-lovers will know what it means. This month’s subjects are all well-known English figures – most of historic importance – and they have been researched and written up by experts in the field or established scribes. Of particular interest is a new study of John Keats – the author was recently the guest-speaker at a seminar on the English Romantic poets at Victoria University and gave a public lecture and newspaper and radio interviews on his subject. We also feature a new work on the Bronte sisters, on Darwin – and Artemis Cooper’s new book on the writer and explorer Patrick Leigh Fermor. Look at the many great books on offer this month and take your pick!!

John Keats : a new life / Nicholas Roe.
“This landmark biography of celebrated Romantic poet John Keats explodes entrenched conceptions of him as a delicate, overly sensitive, tragic figure. Instead, Nicholas Roe reveals the real flesh-and-blood poet: a passionate man driven by ambition but prey to doubt, suspicion, and jealousy; sure of his vocation while bitterly resentful of the obstacles that blighted his career; devoured by sexual desire and frustration; and in thrall to alcohol and opium. Through unparalleled original research, Roe arrives at a fascinating reassessment of Keats’s entire life.” (Summary by www.globalbooksinprint.com).

The Brontës / Juliet Barker.
“The story of the tragic Brontë family is familiar to everyone: we all know about the half-mad, repressive father, the drunken, drug-addled wastrel of a brother, wildly romantic Emily, unrequited Anne, and “poor Charlotte.” Or do we? These stereotypes of the popular imagination are precisely that – imaginary – created by amateur biographers such as Mrs. Gaskell who were primarily novelists and were attracted by the tale of an apparently doomed family of genius.(Summary from www.globalbooksinprint.com).

Patrick Leigh Fermor : an adventure / Artemis Cooper.
“Patrick Leigh Fermor (1915-2011) was a war hero whose exploits in Crete are legendary, and above all he is widely acclaimed as the greatest travel writer of our times, notably for his books about his walk across pre-war Europe.” (Syndetics summary).

Is it just me? / Miranda Hart.
“In ‘Is it Just Me?’, Britain’s best loved comedienne, Miranda Hart, laments on the horrors of growing up and offers her younger self some essential advice on grappling with life’s unexpected perils and blunders”.(Syndetics summary).

The Redgraves : a family epic / Donald Spoto.
“An account of five generations of the Redgrave family traces their achievements and personal lives while offering new revelations based on the author’s insider access as a personal friend of the late Michael Redgrave”.(Syndetics summary).

Darwin : portrait of a genius / Paul Johnson.
“Darwin’s revolutionary career is the perfect vehicle for historian Paul Johnson. Marked by the insightful observation, spectacular wit, and highly readable prose for which Johnson is so well regarded, Darwin brings the gentleman-scientist and his times brilliantly into focus. From Darwin’s birth into great fortune to his voyage aboard the Beagle, to the long-delayed publication of his masterpiece, Johnson delves into what made this Victorian gentleman into a visionary scientist and into the tragic flaws that later led Darwin to support the burgeoning eugenics movement”.(Syndetics summary).

Counting one’s blessings : selected letters of Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother / edited and with a preface by William Shawcross.
“One of the revelations of William Shawcross’s official biography of the Queen Mother was her private correspondence. Indeed the Sunday Times described her letters as ‘wonderful … brimful of liveliness and irreverence, steeliness and sweetness.Queen Elizabeth was a prolific correspondent from her earliest childhood and her letters offer readers a vivid insight into the person behind the public face. They reveal – in her own words – the little girl writing to her family; the young woman who, eventually, accepted Prince Albert’s proposal; the Duchess of York, embracing the public role demanded of her, on royal tours both at home and abroad.”(Summary from www.globalbooksinprint.com).

Mortality / Christopher Hitchens.
“On June 8, 2010, while on a book tour for his bestselling memoir, Hitch-22, Christopher Hitchens was stricken in his New York hotel room with excruciating pain in his chest and thorax. As he would later write in the first of a series of award-winning columns for Vanity Fair, he suddenly found himself being deported “from the country of the well across the stark frontier that marks off the land of malady.” Over the next eighteen months, until his death in Houston on December 15, 2011, he wrote constantly and brilliantly on politics and culture, astonishing readers with his capacity for superior work even in extremis. Throughout the course of his ordeal battling esophageal cancer, Hitchens adamantly and bravely refused the solace of religion, preferring to confront death with both eyes open”. (Summary from www.globalbooksinprint.com).

Edmund Spenser : a life / Andrew Hadfield.
“Edmund Spenser’s innovative poetic works have a central place in the canon of English literature. Yet he is remembered as a morally flawed, self-interested sycophant; complicit in England’s ruthless colonisation of Ireland; in Karl Marx’s words, ‘Elizabeth’s arse-kissing poet’– a man on the make who aspired to be at court and who was prepared to exploit the Irish to get what he wanted. In his vibrant and vivid book, the first biography of the poet for 60 years, Andrew Hadfield finds a more complex and subtle Spenser. How did a man who seemed destined to become a priest or a don become embroiled in politics? If he was intent on social climbing, why was he so astonishingly rude to the good and the great?” (Summary from www.globalbooksinprint.com).

AND ONE FROM IRELAND

Country girl / Edna O’Brien.
“Edna O’Brien’s family encouraged her to attend pharmacy school, but she left before finishing to marry an older writer, give birth to two sons, and publish, in 1960, her first novel.The Country Girlsso scandalized the O’Briens’ local parish that the book was burned by the priest, her family disgraced. COUNTRY GIRL comes twenty-one books later, a rich and heady accounting of the events, people, emotions, and landscape that imprint upon and enliven one lifetime.” (Summary from www. globalbooksinprint.com).

ALSO RECEIVED THIS MONTH :

• After Everest: inside the private world of Edmund Hillary/ Paul Little with Carolyne Meng-Yee
• A wife on Gorge River/ Catherine Stewart
• Air kiss & tell : memoirs of a blow-up doll / Charlotte Dawson with Jo Thornely
• Margaret Mahy : a writer’s life / by Tessa Duder
• This way of life / Sumner Burstyn ; photography by Thomas Burstyn and Norbert Guenther.

The big news this month is the receipt of Salman Rushdie’s long awaited memoir ‘ Joseph Anton’. The title takes its name from the pen-name he adopted after being sentenced to death by Ayatollah Khomeni on the publication of The Satanic verses in 1989.The book is a fascinating mix of autobiography, gossip, literary criticism and the reasons for writing and reading. Donna Rifkind (reviewing this book in The New York Times), says:

Read all of “Joseph Anton,” then, for its lessons in how books are used, and whether they matter

For a lighter but by no means lightweight reading experience, try Kaffe Fassett’s Dreaming in colour.  Kaffe is a master of beautiful designs in patchwork, knitting, needlework and mosaics. It is no exaggeration to say that he has revolutionised these crafts and breathed new life into them. He was the first living textile artist to have a one-man exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum. He has also had a most interesting life and tells a very good story. Take your pick of our new offerings. Happy reading!!

Joseph Anton : a memoir / Salman Rushdie.
“The extraordinary story of how a writer was forced underground, moving from house to house, with the constant presence of an armed police protection team. He was asked to choose an alias that the police could call him by. He thought of writers he loved and combinations of their names; then it came to him: Conrad and Chekhov – Joseph Anton.
How do a writer and his family live with the threat of murder for over nine years? How does he go on working? How does he fall in and out of love? How does despair shape his thoughts and actions, how and why does he stumble, how does he learn to fight back? In this remarkable memoir Rushdie tells that story for the first time; the story of one of the crucial battles, in our time, for freedom of speech. He talks about the sometimes grim, sometimes comic realities of living with armed policemen, and of the close bonds he formed with his protectors; of his struggle for support and understanding from governments, intelligence chiefs, publishers, journalists, and fellow writers; and of how he regained his freedom.” (Summary from www.amazon.co.uk.)

The House of Hancock : the rise and rise of Gina Rinehart / Debi Marshall.
“Gina Rinehart is the richest woman in the world – but at what cost? From an early age Gina Rinehart knew she was heir to one of Australia’s largest fortunes. Her father, Lang Hancock, loved her dearly and groomed her to take over the company. Then along came Rose, the Filipina housekeeper Lang married in 1985, and the obsessively private House of Hancock was changed forever. Hancock’s death in 1992 opened floodgates of litigation, with Rose and Gina fixtures in the courts fighting it out for their share of Lang’s mining assets. The Pilbara Princess has now become the Queen of Litigation, taking on her children and anyone else who dares to challenge her through countless court battles.” (Summary from www.amazon.co.uk).

The Black Count : glory, revolution, betrayal and the real Count of Monte Cristo / Tom Reiss.
“The inspiration for some of the great adventure tales of Alexandre Dumas has long been a subject of curiosity and debate. According to Reiss, the inspiration for the great novel of intrigue, betrayal, and revenge, The Count of Monte Cristo, was Dumas’ own father, General Alexandre Alex Dumas. In this often thrilling and often sad chronicle, Reiss makes clear that Alex lived a life as full of adventure, triumph, and tragic loss as any of his son’s literary creations.” (Summary from Global Books).

The end of your life book club / Will Schwalbe.
“Mary Anne Schwalbe is waiting for her chemotherapy treatments when Will casually asks her what she’s reading. The conversation they have grows into tradition: soon they are reading the same books so they can have something to talk about in the hospital waiting room. Their choices range from classic (Howards End) to popular (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo), from fantastic (The Hobbit) to spiritual (Jon Kabat-Zinn), with many in between. We hear their passion for reading and their love for each other in their intimate and searching discussions. A profoundly moving testament to the power of love between a child and parent, and the power of reading in our lives.” (Summary from www.amazon.co.uk).

My sister Rosalind Franklin / Jenifer Glynn.
“Rosalind Franklin is famous in the history of science for her contribution to the discovery of the structure of DNA, the start of the greatest biological revolution of the twentieth century. Much has been written about the importance of her part, and about how her work was affected by her position as a woman scientist. Above all she was a distinguished scientist, not only in her work on DNA, but also in her earlier work on coals and carbons and in her later work on viruses. In this family memoir her sister, the writer and historian Jenifer Glynn, paints a full picture of Rosalind’s life. Looking at Rosalind’s background; her early education, her time as a science student at Cambridge, and her relations with her family, to her life as an adult and her time in Paris and at King’s, Glynn shows how much her sister achieved and how she was influenced by the social and intellectual climate of the period she worked in.”(Summary from Global Books).

Greta Garbo : divine star / David Bret.
“Though there have been numerous biographies of Greta Garbo, this is the first to fully investigate the two so-called missing periods in the life of this most mysterious and enigmatic of all the Hollywood stars. The first, during the late 1920s when Garbo disappeared completely for several months forcing the studio employed a lookalike, was almost certainly to conceal a pregnancy. The second occurred during World War Two, when Garbo was employed by British Intelligence to track down Nazi sympathisers. In Gr eta Garbo : Divi ne Star David Bret has acquired a large amount of previously unsourced material, along with anecdotes from friends and colleagues of the star which have never before been published. For the first time, he paints a complete portrait of her childhood and youth in Sweden. Bret has also sourced copies of all Garbo s films with the exception Th e Divi ne Wom an of whicch no print survives including the silents, before scenes were trimmed or cut. Additionally the author met Garbo in Paris a few years before she died.”  (Summary from Global Books).

Edith Wharton at home : life at The Mount / Richard Guy Wilson ; foreword by Pauline C. Metcalf ; photographs by John Arthur.
“At once a leader and a recorder of the glamorous Gilded Age society, Edith Wharton is at the pinnacle of American literature and social history. The Mount, her summer “cottage” in the Berkshires, was essential to her success, filled with gatherings of literary figures and artists, and this book documents the story of her life there” (Publisher description)

Hitler’s English girlfriend : the story of Unity Mitford / David Rehak.
“‘Hitler’s English girlfriend’ looks at the life of Unity Mitford, a prominent supporter of fascism and who was part of Hitler’s inner circle of friends and confidants for five years.” (Summary from Global Books).

Dreaming in colour : an autobiography / Kaffe Fassett.
“Kaffe Fassett studied painting on scholarship at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, but left after less than one year and traveled to England, where he ultimately made his home. After struggling to make a living as a fine artist for several years, Fassett met the fashion designer Bill Gibb and began designing knitwear for his collection. He went on to design knitwear for Missoni and for private clients like Lauren Bacall, Shirley MacLaine, and Barbra Streisand, and to revolutionise the hand knitting world with his explosive use of color. Further explorations led him to needlepoint, mosaics, rug-making, yarn and fabric design, set design and quilting” (Summary from Global Books)

Biography-lovers may also enjoy :
The fishing fleet : husband-hunting in the Raj / Anne de Courcy.
“From the late 19th century, when the Raj was at its height, many of Britain’s best and brightest young men went out to India to work as administrators, soldiers and businessmen. With the advent of steam travel and the opening of the Suez Canal, countless young women, suffering at the lack of eligible men in Britain, followed in their wake. This amorphous band was composed of daughters returning after their English education, girls invited to stay with married sisters or friends, and yet others whose declared or undeclared goal was simply to find a husband. They were known as the Fishing Fleet, and this book is their story, hitherto untold.” (Summary from www.amazon.co.uk).

Anyone who has reached into the frosty recesses of the freezer to put her paw on on a packet of frozen peas or a ready-made meal should throw up a prayer of thanksgiving to Clarence Birdseye. This humble fur-trapper working in the wilds of Northern Canada in the early part of the twentieth century invented the freezing process still associated with his name. This was not his only innovation, nor his only field of interest – he was also a noted explorer. He is described in the publisher’s notes as “a tinkerer in the classic Yankee mode,” and “one of a group of men who relied on native intelligence more than education and who’s principal laboratories were garages and basements”. His biography is a most interesting and unusual read.
Also featured in this month’s picks are more marvellous women, including Marie Curie and her daughters and Helena Rubinstein. Happy reading !!

Before I forget / Jacqueline Fahey.
“Jacqueline Fahey brought the curtain down at the end of her first memoir, Something for the Birds, after her marriage to Fraser McDonald. In Before I Forget she continues the story from this happy-ever-after moment, charting her life since 1960.”(Wellington City Libraries catalogue note).

Marie Curie and her daughters : the private lives of science’s first family / Shelley Emling.
“Freelance writer Emling (The Fossil Hunter: Dinosaurs, Evolution, and the Woman Whose Discoveries Changed the World) tells the story of science icon Marie Sklodowska Curie, a name familiar to most readers from elementary school days. The only person to have received Nobel prizes in two different sciences, Curie remains a hero to many. Emling writes here of Curie’s later years and of her relationships with her daughters, topics not previously as well documented as the flashier (not to mention more radioactive) aspects of her life and scientific research. Curie’s trips to the United States and her relationship with magazine editor and socialite Missy Meloney, who started a fund to buy radium for Curie, are covered here in both personal and professional terms. Emling presents a Curie defined not only by her scientific activities but also by her personality and by her relationships with family and friends after she gained international recognition. VERDICT Recommended for readers interested in the history of Western science, scientific biographies, and women in science, as well as those who regard Marie Curie as a hero”.-Eric D. Albright, Tufts Univ. Lib., MA (c) Copyright 2012. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.(c) Copyright 2010. Library

Birdseye : the adventures of a curious man / Mark Kurlansky.
“Although frozen foods made Birds Eye a household name, few were familiar with Clarence Birdseye (1886-1956), developer of the fast-freezing process that became a multibillion-dollar international industry. In the first biography of the eccentric Brooklyn-born inventor, award-winning food author Kurlansky (’Cod’ and ‘Salt”) brings Birdseye to life as he outlines the twists and turns of his unusual career. In a 1945 interview Birdseye stated that G.A. Henty’s 1891 novel Redskin and Cowboy “first influenced him to live the outdoor life.” Yearning for adventure, he dropped out of Amherst College in 1908 and worked in the southwest as a U.S. Biological Survey naturalist, collected ticks in Montana to research Rocky Mountain spotted fever, and became interested in food preservation in the frozen wilderness of Labrador”. Agent, Charlotte Sheedy. (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.” (Publisher Weekly)

My life in two halves : a memoir / Betty Gilderdale.
“Betty Gilderdale lived the first half of her life in England and the second, in New Zealand. This book follows her early childhood in London, the war years, university study, professional life, marriage and children, through to making a new life in New Zealand when she and her husband Alan and their three children moved here in 1967. It was here that she pursued her interest in teaching, and in 1982 published her ground-breaking work “A sea change : 145 years of New Zealand junior fiction: Her story describes a rich and full life of diverse experiences peopled with teaching colleagues, writers, friends and, most importantly, family.”(Wellington City Libraries catalogue note).

Alan Turing : the enigma / Andrew Hodges. Alan Turing: The Enigma
“It is only a slight exaggeration to say that the British mathematician Alan Turing (1912-1954) saved the Allies from the Nazis, invented the computer and artificial intelligence, and anticipated gay liberation by decades–all before his suicide at age forty-one. This classic biography of the founder of computer science, reissued on the centenary of his birth with a substantial new preface by the author, is the definitive account of an extraordinary mind and life. A gripping story of mathematics, computers, cryptography, and homosexual persecution, Andrew Hodges’s acclaimed book captures both the inner and outer drama of Turing’s life.”(Abridged summary from www.globabooksinprint.com).

The kings’ mistresses : the liberated lives of Marie Mancini, Princess Colonna, and her sister Hortense, Duchess Mazarin / Elizabeth C. Goldsmith.
“This title presents the adventures of two, privileged sisters raised in the court of the French King Louis XIV, who fled their husbands and children to travel throughout Europe, gaining notoriety for their escapades as gamblers, cross-dressers, mistresses to various kings, and pioneering women writers. Elizabeth Goldsmith has written a vibrant biography of two pioneering free spirits, feminists long before the term existed, who refused to be constrained by the morals, mores, and hypocrisies of their age.” (Abridged summary from Amazon.co.uk).

Diaries / George Orwell ; edited by Peter Davison ; introduction by Christopher Hitchens.
“Collecting a dozen of Orwell’s personal diaries from the Depression until his final days, this selection offers a glimpse of the great writer observing the world around him. Early entries include accounts of Orwell’s immersive investigations into the hardscrabble routines of coal miners, hop-pickers, and the working poor, and later entries chronicle the first years of WWII. But the majority of his observations and, one senses, the rhythms of his days involve notes and tabulations of more quotidian activities of the agricultural sort: planting crops, milking goats, watching the weather, and, perhaps most significant, counting his hens’ eggs. Although it’s perhaps tempting to probe such material for a new perspective, its real merit may be in allowing readers a close and factual (if only rarely emotionally intimate) view of Orwell’s life, mostly free of biographical narration. As Christopher Hitchens notes in his introduction, Orwell’s determination to seek elusive but verifiable truth, however minor, is on constant display throughout. Thickly annotated, this selection will be appreciated by historical researchers as well as curious browsers”.–Driscoll, Brendan Copyright

Leaves from the fig tree / by Diana Duff.
“Raised by eccentric grandparents at Annesgrove, an Irish stately home, Diana Duff grew up surrounded by family ghosts, banshees and buried treasure. At 18, Diana entered the glamorous world of 1950s Kenya, becoming a stand-in for Grace Kelly before embarking on a career as a nurse. After marrying a young officer in the Colonial Service, Diana spent her nights shivering and alone, gun in hand, as the Mau Mau rebellion threatened to engulf her. Moving to Tanganyika, Diana went on to found the first inter-racial nursery school in East Africa before a transfer saw the family shifting to South Africa in the 1960s at the height of apartheid.” (Summary from Amazon.co.uk).

Helena Rubinstein : the woman who invented beauty / Michèle Fitoussi.
“Helena Rubinstein was an extraordinary pioneering woman who gave her name to a cosmetics empire and revolutionised modern beauty. She understood women. She understood beauty. And she started a revolution. Helena Rubinstein was born into a poor Polish family at the end of the nineteenth century; by the time of her death in 1965 she had built a cosmetics empire that spanned the world. When Rubinstein opened her first salon in Melbourne, her scientific approach to beauty was an instant sensation. Women just couldn’t get enough of her innovative advice on skincare, and her beauty products were constantly sold out. Having conquered Australia, Rubinstein went on to open salons in Europe and America, at a time when women were barely seen in business, let alone running their own multinational companies. For this visionary entrepreneur lived and breathed her work and nobody – lover, husband or child – was allowed to get in the way of business success. Helena Rubinstein was a total original, and her legacy can still be seen today in the methods used to market and manufacture cosmetics. This is her amazing life story”.(Summary from Amazon.co.uk).

Dear Lupin– / Charlie and Roger Mortimer.
“Roger Mortimer’s generous letters to his son are packed with anecdotes and sharp observations, with a unique analogy for each and every scrape Charlie Mortimer got himself into. This title includes 150 letters written to his son as he left school, and lived in places such as South America, Africa, Weston-super-Mare and eventually London.These letters form a memoir of their relationship, and an affectionate portrait of a time gone by.” (Summary from www.globalbooksinprint.com.)

Paris : a love story : a memoir / Kati Marton.
“Saturated with sadness, regret, and Hemingway, Marton’s (Wallenberg: The Incredible True Story) memoir of widowhood after the death of husband Richard Holbrooke recalls how Paris offered her the peace and salve she needed to assuage a broken heart. A refugee from Hungary with her family in 1957, Paris was where Marton attended university during the tumultuous late 1960s; as a foreign correspondent with ABC News in the 1970s, the city served as a base for her work, and was also where she and anchorman Peter Jennings conducted their love affair before marrying in 1979. Fleeing that marriage in 1993 after two children (Jennings is described as cold and manipulative), Marton found a warm, willing relationship with Holbrooke, then U.S. ambassador to Germany, with Paris as the meeting place in their busy lives.” Agent, Amanda Urban. (Aug.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved(Publisher Weekly)

Sometimes we think it is all happening elsewhere – Britain, Europe, USA – but quite a lot is going on here in Kiwiland. For a country of such small size and population we produce many talented and innovative people. This month we feature biographies of a noted writer, a quirky businessman, a well-known actress and a much loved former former mayor of Auckland. Anne Perry, the famous writer of detective novels, is not a New Zealander but she spent several formative years here, during which she, together with her best friend, committed a shocking murder. Joan Drayton has done a masterly job of telling her story. Helen Brown, who won our hearts with the story of the liittle cat who saved her family from sorrow and heartbreak, has written another about the animal who succeeeded her. Here’s to New Zealand!! Happy reading.

Touchstones : memories of people and place / James McNeish.
“A young man leaves home as a deckhand on a Norwegian freighter, to travel the world. He returns to New Zealand changed almost beyond recognition. Along the way he meets nine people who influence his life and help make him the writer he becomes. James McNeish’s Touchstones has a cast of characters who include ‘the Mother Courage of the English theatre’, an anti-Mafia reformer in Sicily, a Kanak revolutionary who is assassinated, a rejected cousin and ‘Mr Punch in naval uniform’, the New Zealand poet Denis Glover. All are larger than life. Some of them, like the author’s mysterious Maori aunt, are good enough to bottle. The book is witty, poignant and in the words of its editor, Emma Neale, ‘rich in astonishing anecdote’. It is at once a self-portrait, a hymn to a vanishing New Zealand, and the first time James McNeish has written about himself.” – (adapted from Syndetics summary)

A year in the life of a duchess : Catherine, HRH The Duchess of Cambridge / Ian Lloyd.
“This gorgeously illustrated book celebrates Kate Middleton’s triumphal first year as the Duchess of Cambridge. It details her public appearances, her honeymoon in the Seychelles, her first official trip to North America, and much more, showing how the world has embraced her as the people’s duchess. There’s also coverage of William and Kate’s first Christmas as a married couple and other important milestones, and a photographic selection of the most stunning outfits worn by Kate over the past year.” – (adapted from Syndetics summary)

The baroness : the search for Nica, the rebellious Rothschild / Hannah Rothschild.
“A Rothschild by birth and a Baroness by marriage, beautiful, spirited Pannonica – known as Nica – seemed to have it all: children, a handsome husband and a trust fund. But in the early 1950s she heard a piece by the jazz legend Thelonious Monk. The music overtook her like a magic spell, and she abandoned her marriage to go and find him.” – (adapted from Syndetics summary)

Dearie : the remarkable life of Julia Child / Bob Spitz.
“On November 3, 1948, a lunch in a Paris restaurant of sole meuniere, the sole so very fresh with its delicate texture and cooked like an omelet in nothing but a bath of clarified butter, changed Julia Child’s life. In that moment, Child (1912-2004) recognized and embraced food as her calling, setting out initially to learn the finer points of cooking, and French cooking in particular. In this affectionate and entertaining tribute to the witty, down-to-earth, bumptious, and passionate host of The French Chef.” – (adapted from Publisher Weekly summary)

After Cleo: came Jonah : how a crazy kitten and a rebelling daughter turned out to be blessings in disguise / Helen Brown.
“Many strong minded women have headstrong daughters. But this isn’t supposed to extend to their cats… Some say your previous cat chooses their successor. If so, what in cat heaven’s name was Helen Brown’s beloved Cleo thinking when she sent a crazy kitten like Jonah? Helen Brown swore she’d never get another kitten. But while she was recovering from major surgery an unscheduled visit to a pet shop resulted in the explosive arrival of a Siamese kitten.” – (adapted from Syndetics summary)

Urban legend : Sir Dove-Myer Robinson / John Edgar.
“One of New Zealand’s most popular and colourful local politicians, Dove-Myer Robinson (1901-1989) was the longest-serving mayor of Auckland city, holding office for 18 years between 1959 and 1980. A controversial figure during his time as mayor, Robinson has today taken on iconic status largely because of his ahead of the times vision. In 2011 we often hear the refrain “They should have listened to Robbie”. URBAN LEGEND explores Robinson’s life from his hard days growing up in a working class Jewish family in Sheffield to his reluctant retirement from Auckland local government in 1980.” – (adapted from Syndetics summary)

Serious fun : the life and times of Alan Gibbs / Paul Goldsmith.
“A man who in his twenties dared to take on the cosy club of import licence-holders who controlled the New Zealand car industry by building his own car for commercial production was always going to be someone to watch. Who could have picked, however, back in the early 1970s, that this young engineer would one day persuade Sir Richard Branson to zip across the English channel in his amphibious car, the Aquada? The life of businessman, inventor, merchant banker, philanthropist, art collector, adventurer and inveterate traveller Alan Gibbs has been far from ordinary.” – (adapted from Syndetics summary)

John Huston : courage and art / Jeffrey Meyers
“Veteran biographer Meyers steps into the ring with legendary movie director John Huston and proves adept at wrestling the larger-than-life figure onto the page. He does it by achieving a nice balance between the life and the work, playing off the flamboyant Huston’s romantic escapades (five marriages and hundreds of mistresses), world-class drinking (often in the company of good friend Humphrey Bogart), and reckless gambling against his prodigious appetite for work (he directed more than 40 films, including multiple masterpieces, ranging from his first directorial effort, The Maltese Falcon, in 1941, through his finale, James Joyce’s The Dead, in 1987).” – (adapted from Syndetics summary)

Tina Grenville : a life in three acts.
“Tina Grenville always wanted to be an actress. Widowed at the age of 20, in mysterious and still unresolved circumstances, she was forced to find work as a housekeeper on a remote Hawkes Bay farm. Eventually able to move to Auckland with her young son, she became first a radio actress, then a leading photographic and catwalk model, . One of Paddy’s Girls, an elite stable of top models, in 1964 she won ‘Model of the Year’ . Encouraged to move to Australia, she was a resounding success, in demand with leading couturiers and top fashion magazines. Finally achieving her childhood ambition, she became a long-standing cast member on Logie award-winning series ‘The Godfathers’. and a regular guest on television game shows and Paramount telemovies.” – (adapted from Amazon.com summary)

Branson / Tom Bower.
“The sensational critical biography of this phenomenal entrepreneur and his business practices – fully updated to cover Branson’s recent ventures.No British tycoon is more popular, few claim to be richer and none has masterminded a more recognisable brand than Richard Branson. What is behind the success of the buccaneering balloonist, the tabloids’ favourite celebrity nude, the ‘grinning jumper’ and the scourge of corporate goliaths?. Helped by eyewitness accounts of more than 250 people with direct experience of Branson, Tom Bower has a uncovered a different tale to the one so eagerly promoted by Virgin’s publicists. Here is the full story of Branson: his businesses, his friendships, his ambition, his law-breaking, his drug-taking, his bullying. From the cockpit of a balloon in the clouds to the centre of Branson’s operations in his Holland Park home this book is an intimate scrutiny of exactly how Richard Branson created himself and sold himself.” – (adapted from Syndetics summary)

The search for Anne Perry / Joanne Drayton.
“Until 1994, the world knew Anne Perry as the writer of bestselling crime fiction at the peak of her writing career. But following the release of Peter Jackson’s film Heavenly Creatures about the sensational 1954 Parker-Hulme murders, came the shocking revelation that Anne Perry started life as Juliet Hulme, the teenager jointly convicted of murdering her friend’s mother. Life would never be the same for Anne. That a convicted murderer had gone on to become a celebrated crime writer with worldwide sales of over 25 million books was tantalizing enough. But careful analysis of her writing reveals that these were more than simple crime stories; spiritual and philosophical complexities thread the way through Anne Perry’s works and the characters she creates. Was Anne, in fact, revealing more about herself in the characters she was creating? Acclaimed biographer Joanne Drayton takes on the challenge of exploring Anne Perry’s writing to uncover her world view and her compulsion to write.” – (adapted from Syndetics summary)

This month we feature the amazing story of Flora Sandes, the gently-born daughter of an English clergyman who became the only British woman to enlist as a soldier in The First World War. She was deployed to Serbia, initially serving as an ambulance driver and First Aid nurse, but through force of circumstances she became a soldier in the Serbian army She displayed exemplary courage and excellent organisational skills – these were recognised by her receipt of Serbia’s highest military honour, the King George star. She became a celebrity in both Britain and Serbia and rose quickly through the ranks, being commmissioned as an officer at the end of the war. The many fascinating aspects of this woman’s story are fully explored in this book. Those who enjoyed Tomorrow to be brave by Susan Travers, and Nancy Wake: a biography of our greatest war heroine by Peter FitzSimmons will be pleased to welcome another stout heart to the sorority.

18 bookshops / Anne Scott.
“Anne Scott has never housed her books in order of theme or author yet she knows where each of them is and the kind of life it has led. Some have been gifts but most have been chosen in bookshops unique in their style and possibilities. Gradually some of the shops become partners with her as her life changes and so do they. They have been observers of discovery, decisions, and marvels with her, following the line of her time and place.Some are everyday shops with a shelf of books in a corner, some are beginning again after long lives as churches, printing presses, medieval houses, a petrol-station. There are a few the author is too late to see: early print-houses and booksellers. They are here too in this book, searched for and described, side by side with all the bookshops open now and busy with readers. This book is about them. Not one is like another. In one way, the book is a sequence about writing. But first it is a map of books and a life.” – (adapted from Amazon.co.uk summary)

Fooling Houdini : magicians, mentalists, math geeks, & the hidden powers of the mind / Alex Stone.
“When Alex Stone was five years old, his father bought him a magic kit, sparking a lifelong love. Years later, living in New York City, he discovered a vibrant underground magic scene populated by a fascinating cast of characters: from his gruff mentor, who holds court in the back of a rundown pizza shop, to one of the world’s greatest card cheats, who happens to be blind. From New York City’s century-old magic societies to cutting-edge psychology labs, Fooling Houdini recounts Stone’s quest to join the ranks of master magicians. But his journey is more than a tale of tricks, gigs, and geeks. In trying to understand how expert magicians manipulate our minds to create their illusions, Stone investigates some of the lesser-known corners of psychology, neuroscience, physics, history, and even crime.” – (adapted from Publisher’s summary)

Eleanor of Aquitaine: Queen of France, Queen of England / Ralph V. Turner.
“Eleanor of Aquitaine’s extraordinary life seems more likely to be found in the pages of fiction. Proud daughter of a distinguished French dynasty, she married the king of France, Louis VII, then the king of England, Henry II, and gave birth to two sons who rose to take the English throne – Richard the Lionheart and John. Renowned for her beauty, hungry for power, headstrong, and unconventional, Eleanor travelled on crusades, acted as regent for Henry II and later for Richard, incited rebellion, endured a fifteen-year imprisonment, and as an elderly widow still wielded political power with energy and enthusiasm. This gripping biography is the definitive account of the most important queen of the Middle Ages.” – (adapted from Amazon.co.uk summary)

Burying the typewriter : childhood under the eye of the secret police / Carmen Bugan.
“Carmen Bugan grew up amid the bounty of the Romanian countryside on her grandparent’s farm where food and laughter were plentiful. But eventually her father’s behavior was too disturbing to ignore. He wept when listening to Radio Free Europe, hid pamphlets in sacks of dried beans, and mysteriously buried and reburied a typewriter. When she discovered he was a political dissident she became anxious for him to conform.” – (adapted from Amazon.com summary)

The natural laws of good luck : a memoir of an unlikely marriage / Ellen Graf.
“Graf tells the quirky and funny story of how she marries a man from China whom she barely knows. “The Natural Laws of Good Luck” is a story of acceptance and of love beyond words. It is also a tale of finding renewal at midlife by taking a brave leap into the unknown.” – (adapted from Syndetics summary)

A nurse abroad : adventures in nursing from the Artic to the outback / Anne Watts.
“In the early 1960s, Anne Watts was a newly qualified nurse, eager to use her skills. Her father expected her to work locally, not too far from North Wales, where Anne had grown up, and to then settle down and have children. However, Anne had inherited her father’s adventurous spirit and at the first opportunity she set sail for Canada to work in the remote stations in the frozen north of the country. She found a placement easily, among the indigenous Inuit people. With the whole world to explore, Anne later headed for Alice Springs in the Australian outback. She speaks eloquently about what it was like to be a nurse and midwife among a tough cattle-ranching community who lived in close proximity with Australia’s Aboriginal people. Anne’s eyes were opened to their skills at surviving the harshest of environments, but also to the prejudices they suffered. Forty years later, Anne returned to both countries to see how life has changed in Eskimo Point and Alice Springs, and what has become of its people and landscape.” – (adapted from Amazon.co.uk summary)

A fine brother : the life of Captain Flora Sandes / Louise Miller.
“The only woman to serve as a soldier in the First World War, the Englishwoman Flora Sandes became a hero and media sensation when she fought for the Serbian Army and pursued a distinguished career in its ranks as officer. This account charts her incredible story, from her tomboyish childhood in genteel Victorian England, her mission to Serbia as a Red Cross volunteer and subsequent military enrolment, her celebrity lecture tours of Europe, her marriage to a fellow officer and her survival of a Gestapo prison during the Second World War to her final years in Suffolk. A fascinating character of her times and an inspiration to women the world over, Flora Sandes is brought to life and restored to her rightful place in history by this authorized biography – compiled with the help of her family, and using hitherto unused private papers and photographs.” – (adapted from Amazon.co.uk summary)

Good in a crisis : a memoir / Margaret Overton.
“During the four years of physician Margaret Overton’s acrimonious divorce, she dated widely and sometimes indiscriminately, determined to find her soulmate and live happily ever after. But then she discovered she had a brain aneurysm. She discovered it at a particularly awkward moment on a date with one of many Mr Wrongs. Overton, an anaesthetist, realised she had been so busy looking after the needs of others that she had forgotten to look after herself. So she set out on a course to take control of her future and finally become independent of men. Good in a Crisis is Overton’s laugh-out-loud account of dealing with the most serious of life’s problems: loss of life, loss of love and loss of innocence. It is a story of spirituality and self-delusion; of coming of age in adulthood and of navigating the terrible events that can cluster in midlife. Honest, hopeful and hilarious, this unforgettable memoir will make you laugh and cry. It will leave you a lot humbler, and just a little wiser.” – (adapted from Amazon.co.uk summary)

Strindberg : a life / Sue Prideaux.
“Novelist, satirist, poet, photographer, painter, alchemist, and hellraiser – August Strindberg was all these, and yet he is principally known, in Arthur Miller’s words, as the mad inventor of modern theater. This title describes the eventful and complicated life of one of the great literary figures in world literature.” – (adapted from Catalogue summary)

It would be difficult to imagine a more horrible fate than that suffered by beautiful young Briton Katie Piper, she was brutally raped and burned with acid by a jealous boyfriend. Yet she survived and her energy, courage and positive mental attitude have been an inspiration to many thousands who are suffering from life’s hardships. She is already very well-known – several younger members of staff here recognised her immediately on seeing the book, as she has been the subject of numerous articles and television interviews. It is a very inspiring book and one which will help very many people. We also have another book by Katie Piper in the library, Beautiful : a beautiful girl, an evil man, one inspiring true story of courage.

Winston Churchill : portrait of an unquiet mind / Andrew Norman.
“Winston Churchill was an extraordinary person – a politician, a statesman, a man of letters and a soldier but it was for his wartime leadership during the Second World War that he is chiefly remembered. In a study of his life, certain bizarre character traits become discernible. He had excessive energy and required little sleep. His mind would either flit from one idea to another with bewildering speed or focus obsessively on one particular goal. He was impulsive, and his attention was easily drawn to irrelevant or unimportant matters. He enjoyed taking risks almost To The point of self-destruction. He lacked inhibition and was eccentric in the extreme. Yet at other times, when he was afflicted with what he called his ‘Black Dog’, he became depressed, irritable, aggressive, and preoccupied with death and thoughts of suicide.By closely and painstakingly examining the statements of Churchill’s doctor, Of Winston himself, his family, his friends and acquaintances, Dr Norman, As a medical man, has been able to ascertain the true nature of Winston’s disorder. The diagnosis having been made, it is now possible For The very first time, and this will remain secret until the book is published, To Understand The man himself and what made him ‘tick’.” – (adapted from Globalbooksinprint.com summary)

French ties : love, life & recipes / Jane Webster ; photography by Robyn Lea and Mark Roper.
“After years of painstaking work renovating an old château in Normandy, Jane Webster has found her bearings, running The French table over the summers and juggling family life across two countries year-around. In this, her second book, she offers us a glimpse into life as a local in a French village: keeping house, visiting the markets, restoring the walled kitchen garden, and indulging her passion for ‘antiquing’ at flea markets and antique fairs. Above all, she shares the simple pleasure of cooking for family and friends.” – (adapted from Syndetics summary)

Jasmine and fire : a bittersweet year in Beirut / Salma Abdelnour.
“Abdelnour moved from a life and career in New York as a travel and food writer back to Beirut, a city her family fled in 1981, during the Lebanese civil war. Growing up in the U.S. through adolescence and young adulthood, she felt that she belonged neither in the U.S. nor in Lebanon, which she occasionally visited. In her late thirties, in an effort to explore her true feelings about Beirut and its relentless tug on her heart, she committed to living there for a year. What she found was a vibrant but still turbulent city as she lived with continued military conflicts, unreliable electricity, erratic Internet access, and confusing social codes. She also found an extensive network of family and friends and fond memories of childhood. Abdelnour compares life in New York and Beirut, and throughout, she examines the meaning of home and belonging.” – (adapted from Publishers’ Weekly summary)

Young Herriot : the early life and times of James Herriot / by John Lewis-Stempel.
‘We had no antibiotics, few drugs. A lot of time was spent pouring things down cows’ throats. The whole thing added up to a lot of laughs. There’s more science now, but not so many laughs.’ We all know James Herriot, possibly the most famous vet in the world. But how did a young student named Alf Wight become the man who would charm millions of readers the world over? Young James tells the fascinating story of James Herriot’s formative years at veterinary college. Set in Glasgow in the 1930s – pre-antibiotics, when veterinary practise was, as Herriot wrote, ‘more art than science’ – the book shines a light on his calling to work with animals (which began when he read an article in Meccano Magazine entitled ‘Veterinary Surgery as a Career’), his early friendships and quest for knowledge at Glasgow’s Veterinary College and the quest for knowledge at Glasgow’s Veterinary College.” – (adapted from Syndetics summary)

Ben Jonson : a life / Ian Donaldson.
“With the exception of Shakespeare, his older contemporary, Ben Jonson is the greatest playwright of the British Renaissance, with achievements across tragedy, satire, comedy-where arguably he exceeds Shakespeare-and court masques. He also excelled as a poet. Donaldson (honorary professorial fellow, Sch. of Culture & Communication, Univ. of Melbourne, Australia) is one of the general editors of the forthcoming Cambridge Edition of the Works of Ben Jonson (Feb. 2012). He brings to this critical biography a thorough knowledge of Jonson’s works and the most up-to-date scholarly and textual research. Though starting with Jonson’s vertical burial and the fate of his bones, Donaldson’s approach is roughly chronological, dividing Jonson’s life into four- to eight-year segments, presenting a good balance between his discussion of specific works and their biographical contexts.” – (adapted from Library Journal summary)

“Things get better / Katie Piper.
“To look and listen to the extraordinary Katie Piper, it is difficult to comprehend the severe physical and psychological trauma she suffered from a brutal rape and acid attack which left her with deep physical and emotional scars. These terrible events would have crushed most people, but through her incredible courage, bright and positive outlook and sheer determination, Katie has become living proof that no matter what life throws at you, if you work hard and believe – things will get better. Katie’s story alone has proved inspirational to millions of people, and now in this important book she begins to answer the question that everyone wants to know – ‘where did you find the courage?’ Katie shares the key steps and support that led to her emotional recovery so that she can help others in their own lives, whether suffering a breakup or life change or more serious trauma. Through her own stories of emotional recovery and in letters sent to her by others, she acknowledges the pain we have all felt at times, whether physical or psychological, grief or trauma, and shows with spectacular compassion and encouragement that we can all find the strength within to carry on.” – (adapted from Globalbooksinprint.com summary)

Core of my heart, my country : women’s sense of place and the land in Australia & Canada / Maggie MacKellar.
“The way places shape individual and community identities are explored in this history of women’s experiences in the Australian and Canadian frontier in the 19th and early 20th centuries. The personal experiences of these women are diverse, ranging from running the local medical facility, raising children, and scaling mountains to studying botany, learning native languages, and riding horses. Weaving together the lives of women who lived in different landscapes, climates, and eras, this historical study ties their stories together with contemporary reflections of the author.” – (adapted from Globalbooksinprint.com summary)

Out of the blue / Joanna Fincham.
“When Joanna Fincham appeared on a popular reality TV program in 2008 looking for love, little did the viewers know that Jo had been suffering from depression on and off throughout life. Jo, it seemed, was a vivacious city girl looking for love with a handsome farmer. On screen she appeared bubbly, warm and happy but in reality she had struggled with depression and bulimia for many years, both illnesses bringing their own difficulties and experiences. Despite her struggles, Jo went on to find love on the show with Farmer Rob. In a fairytale ending Jo moved to the countryside and left her city life behind her. Now living on their farm in South Australia, Rob and Jo got married and had a gorgeous baby daughter. This is the story of how Jo tackled her demons, found love and created a new, healthy, happy life free from depression. It’s a story of how love really can conquer all and how life on the land can heal and nurture you. Inspiring, warm and fiercely honest, this is a wonderful personal account of overcoming adversity and making the most of life.” – (adapted from Globalbooksinprint.com summary)

I never promised you a goodie bag : a memoir of a life through events–the ones you plan and the ones you don’t / Jennifer Gilbert.
“A warm, wise, and wholly original memoir of survival, renewal, and transformation, by one of New York City’s most successful and respected special events coordinators. With her top-level events company, Save the Date, Jennifer Gilbert has worked with Fortune 500 companies, broadcast media giants, international nonprofit organizations, and celebrities from Oprah Winfrey to Bill Gates and beyond. Yet few of her clients or colleagues have known, until now, that Jennifer not only a self-made success: she’s also a survivor. After a random, near-fatal attack left her body in critical condition on a crowded city street, and left her with emotional wounds that would take years to heal, Jennifer embarked upon a journey to reclaim her life. This is her story, in her own words: I Never Promised You a Goodie Bag, an intimate, poignant, inspiring memoir of perseverance, rediscovery, and hope.” – (adapted from Globalbooksinprint.com summary)

The genius in my basement : the biography of a happy man / Alexander Masters.Simon: The Genius in My Basement
“Simon Norton won a gold medal at the International Math Olympiad at the age of 15 and again at 16; folks said he was the greatest English mathematician since Sir Isaac Newton. A Daily Mail headline from July 4, 1967, says of Norton, ‘SEATED, SECOND FROM RIGHT: A GENIUS.’ Norton had just scored 195 out of 200 on the infamous British Math Olympiad for Schools, saying of the International Olympiad to which he now aspired, ‘I’ve seen papers from previous years and I must say they don’t seem too difficult.’ And yet, with such promise, Norton always flirted with a darker life, and in this searing biography/memoir of him, Alexander Masters reveals just what happened to Norton to make him eschew regular math — he was a star at Cambridge as an undergrad and post-grad student — for a paranoid and difficult life obsessively spent taking bus rides all over England. And what happened is that Norton became fixated on The Monster, a set of numbers so vast that its discovery was hailed by the Mathematical Association of America as ‘one of the most spectacular and mysterious achievements of the last fifty years.’ And like Stuart, in The Genius in My Basement we read the biography of a non-famous person, an unknown who is yet extraordinary, someone we might pass by as an oddball, but who is, in fact, one of the great minds of this, or any, century” – (adapted from Publisher’s description)

A difficult woman : the challenging life and times of Lillian Hellman / Alice Kessler-Harris.
“In this superb biography of Lillian Hellman (1905-84), Kessler-Harris (R. Gordon Hoxie Professor of American History, Columbia Univ.; Out To Work: A History of Wage-Earning Women in the United States) deftly intertwines the playwright’s story with that of a continually changing modern culture. She discusses Hellman’s early upbringing, personal relationships with Dashiell Hammett and others, plays (e.g., The Children’s Hour; The Little Foxes; Watch on the Rhine) and their backgrounds and subtle moral complexities, controversial political views and trouble during the McCarthy era, and turbulent final years. Kessler-Harris provides in-depth analyses and objective commentary in a seamless, comprehensive biographical portrait-one of an often contradictory individual, at once charming and abrasive, talented and insecure, and an advocate of truth who was also publicly accused of lying. The innovative and defiantly independent Hellman is placed at the heart of a social landscape from the 1920s and the Great Depression through the Cold War, Civil Rights Movement, and beyond.” – (adapted from Library Journal summary)