Biography
Deeply flawed life of Cap’n Bob
Christopher Silvester reveals how this biography of Robert Maxwell is a skilfully constructed page-turner
Arthur Bryant’s floating doters
W. Sydney Robinson, the historian’s latest biographer, discovered that his subject was without scruple in matters of the heart
A kind of loving
Lincoln Allison is moved by a cache of his father’s wartime love letters and what they reveal about conflict, his parents’ relationship — and a huge generational chasm
Biography and the perils of possessive families
Nigel Jones, a chastened practitioner of writing biographies, warns that writing someone’s life can be a dangerous venture
Peculiar world of a singular talent
Highsmith was a great writer, with a moral vision bracing enough to clarify the terrors of the twentieth century
Bedtime reading for boomers
You will search in vain for a new life of any rocker who made his name after the advent of punk
Poignant power of cheap food
Would I read it if the subject wasn’t famous? One has to say yes, with chips and curry sauce
A foodie in his element
The author is evenhanded and accurate about the nouvelle cuisine movement, says Paul Levy
Unvarnished tyranny
This is perhaps the only book I have yet read about Amin which gives anything like an accurate assessment of who he was
The tragic downfall of Lord Alfred Douglas
The 20th-anniversary edition of Douglas Murray’s Bosie remains the seminal account of the tragic life of Lord Alfred Douglas