Joseph Delaney used to be an English teacher, before becoming the best-selling author of the Spook's series, which has been published in 30 countries and sold over 4.5 million copies worldwide. The first book, The Spook's Apprentice, was adapted into a major motion picture starring Jeff Bridges and Julianne Moore.

Joseph Delaney

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Simon Goddard

They had just a few hundred pounds, one band missing a drummer, a sock drawer for an office, more dreams than sense and not a clue between them how to run a record company. But when Alan Horne and Edwyn Collins decided to start their own label from a shabby Glasgow flat in 1979, nobody was going to stand in their way. 
 
Postcard Records was the mad, makeshift and quite preposterous result. Launching the careers of Orange Juice, Aztec Camera and cult heroes Josef K, the self-styled ‘Sound of Young Scotland’ stuck it to the London music biz and, quite by accident, kickstarted the 1980s indie music revolution. 
 
Simon Goddard has interviewed everyone involved in the making of the Postcard legend to tell this thrilling rock’n’roll story of punk audacity, knickerbocker glories, broken windscreens, raccoon-fur hats, comedy, violence and creating something beautiful from nothing, against all the odds.

Simply Thrilled

The Preposterous Story of Postcard Records

Ronan Keating

'Brilliant' OK!  'Engagingly warm'  Heat  'Sensational' The Mirror'Ronan Keating demolishes his 'Mr Perfect of Pop image in a new warts-and-all book of his amazing ride to stardom.'  The MirrorRonan Keating is a very real idol. In a life-story that received extensive press and ecstatic reviews as  'a classic - honest, funny and gripping', Ronan Keating tells the full story of his incredible journey. He may be only 23 but he has lived an extraordinary life so far, from playing football on a housing estate in North Dublin to headlining Madison Square Garden with Elton John. But Ronan has never forgotten it's his fans that got him there.     It's an inspirational story of a boy from modest beginnings who confounded the critics and made his mark with talent, boyish good looks and, above all, an integrity that has helped him move from the teen market to a broader, adult audience. In a surprisingly honest, remarkably frank style he talks openly of his background and his beloved mother, Boyzone's extraordinary catapult to fame, his friends and band-mates and his new solo career and his wife and son.      Brimming with anecdote and revelation, this is a brilliantly written book by a true star - Ronan.

Life Is A Rollercoaster

Eddie Rowley

When Shane, Kian, Mark, Nicky and Bryan celebrated the beginning of 2001 in true Irish style, they had no idea of the adventures that lay ahead. Eddie Rowley, co-author of Ronan Keating's bestselling autobiography Life is A Rollercoaster, followed Westlife on their biggest ever world tour. From Dublin where they attempted their first dance routine ('look lads, no stools') via Wembley to the Far East, it was a mad whirl of hotels, screaming girls, late night parties and McDonald's hamburgers. It was their most expensive tour ever, and certainly the most exhausting! Along the way we witness the ups and downs of the boys' lives in the sometimes dangerous, sometimes lonely goldfish-bowl world of pop. And  through it all we get to see in unprecedented detail the true personalities that make up the phenomenon that is Westlife. A rip-roaring read and the most penetrating look yet at the UK's most successful boy band- ever.

Westlife On Tour

David Lee Roth

'I WAS THERE WITH THESE TWO GIRLS ONCE; THEY WERE STRIPPERS. THEY SAID 'DAVE, WE'D LIKE YOU TO GO UPSTAIRS, THE TWO OF US, WITH YOU. ' SO I SAID, 'OKAY'. IT WAS ANGUS, AND IT WAS HOT AND SWEATY AND HUMID, AND WE COMMENCED TO DELIVER THE GROCERIES AT 138 BEATS PER MINUTE OR MORE. ONE OF THE GIRLS HAD $1500 IN SINGLES AND FIVES AND TENS, HER END-OF-THE-WEEK TIPS AND PAY AND EVERYTHING IN HER G-STRING. NOBODY NOTICED, YOU KNOW, WHEN THE G-STRING CAME UNDONE -- WELL, I NOTICED -- NOBODY NOTICED THE MONEY, LIKE, FLOATING AROUND. I WOKE UP AT SOME POINT AROUND DAWN, THE TWO OF THEM WERE ASLEEP, AND ALL THREE OF US WERE COVERED WITH MONEY, EVERY SQUARE INCH OF SKIN HAD A DOLLAR BILL PASTED TO IT -- THERE WAS NOTHING BUT. THE WHOLE BED WAS COVERED WITH BILLS. OUR BODIES WERE COVERED WITH BILLS. THERE WAS BILLS IN MY UNDERWEAR. TAKE A LITTLE PICTURE OF THAT. ' So begins perhaps the ultimate rock autobiography. Throughout the late-seventies and eighties Van Halen were the archetypal American rock group. Whats more they were also the highest paid band in the history of show business, taking a cool $1 million for a night's work at a festival in 1983 and making the Guiness Book of Records.

Crazy From The Heat

Steven Patrick Morrissey is one of the most original and controversial voices in the history of popular music. With The Smiths, he led the most influential British guitar group of the 1980s, his enigmatic wit and style defining a generation. As a solo artist, he has continued to broach subjects no other singer would dare. 
 
Worshipped by some, vilified by others, Morrissey is a unique rock and roll creation. The 300,000 words of Mozipedia make this the most intimate and in-depth biographical portrait of the man and his music yet. Bringing together every song, album, collaborator, key location, every hero, book, film and record to have influenced his art, it is the summation of years of meticulous research. Morrissey authority Simon Goddard has interviewed almost everybody of any importance, making Mozipedia the last word on Morrissey and The Smiths.

Mozipedia

The Encyclopaedia of Morrissey and the Smiths

Andrew Matheson

**MOJO MAGAZINE'S BOOK OF THE YEAR** 
 
The Hollywood Brats are the greatest band you’ve never heard of. 
 
Recording one near-perfect punk album in 1974, they were tragically ahead of their time. 
 
With only a guitar, a tatty copy of the Melody Maker and his template for the perfect band, Andrew Matheson set out, in 1971, to make musical history. His band, The Hollywood Brats, were pre-punk prophets – uncompromising, ultra-thin, wild, untameable and outrageous. But thrown into the crazy world of the 1970s London music scene, the Brats ultimately fell foul of the crooks and heavies that ran it and an industry that just wasn’t ready for them. 
 
Directly inspiring the London SS, the Clash, Malcolm McLaren and the Sex Pistols, The Hollywood Brats imploded too soon to share the glory. Punk’s answer to Withnail and I, Sick On You is a startling, funny and brilliantly entertaining period memoir about never quite achieving success, despite flying so close to greatness.

Sick On You

The Disastrous Story of The Hollywood Brats

The Disastrous Story of Britain’s Great Lost Punk Band

Jim Melly

'There was this terrible trough in the mid-70s: England didn't qualify forthe 1974 World Cup, Miss Hall our English teacher left school, and the Faces split.' Billy BraggDo you remember The Faces?  The group that was born out of the ashes of the legendary sixties band the Small Faces, but with the addition of Ron Wood on guitar (later to join the Stones) and Rod Stewart on vocals. Last Orders, Please is the first biography of the band who have acquired legendary status in the annals of rock 'n' roll history.  It's also a book about Britain in a forgotten era - the early seventies.  Not the seventies of Glam Rock, Sweet and Gary Glitter, but the real seventies of the three day week, trade union strikes, blackouts, the IRA, steak, chips and warm beer. In these difficult times it was the Faces - a soulful, goodtime band who drank and played hard, who didn't dress to impress, but just got on with the job -  that the working class adopted as its own.  In the days before football was fashionable the Faces played soccer on stage on TOTP. In 1974 this was a near-political act that confirmed The Faces as truly a people's band, and they are still loved, and revered to this day.

Last Orders Please

Rod Stewart, the Faces and the Britain we forgot

John Robb

'The Stone Roses have become folk heroes, frozen in time. And their story, with roots in punk through post-punk, scooter boys, skinheads, Northern Soul, psychedelia, acid house and Madchester, is everything that is great about British street culture.' 
 
Reni. Mani. Ian Brown. John Squire. 
 
Names that will forever be remembered for creating their defining album The Stone Roses and a unique but inimitable baggy style. 
 
Their phenomenal story was first documented by the man who was with them every step of the way: John Robb. And now, in this special edition of his acclaimed and intimate biography, Robb brings the ultimate rock 'n' roll tale fully up to date.

The Stone Roses And The Resurrection of British Pop

The Reunion Edition

Grace Maxwell

In February 2005, Edwyn Collins suffered two devastating brain haemorrhages. He should have died. Doctors advised that if he did survive, there would be little of him left. If that wasn't enough, he went on to contract MRSA as a result of an operation to his skull and spent six months in hospital. Initially, Edwyn couldn't speak, read, write, walk, sit up or feed himself. He had lost all movement in his right side and was suffering from aphasia - an inability to use or understand language. When he initially recovered consciousness the only words he could say were 'Grace', 'Maxwell', 'yes' and 'no'. 
 
But with the help of his partner Grace and their son Will, Edwyn fought back. Slowly, and with monumental effort, he began to teach his brain to read and speak all over again - with some areas of his mind it was if he had been a slate wiped utterly clean. Through a long and arduous road of therapy he began to re-inhabit his body until he could walk again. 
 
Grace's story is an intimate and inspiring account of what you do to survive when your husband is all but taken away without warning by a stroke.

Falling and Laughing

The Restoration of Edwyn Collins

Stephen Davis

Jim Morrison's electrifying live performances, and appetite for sexual and psychedelic experience enflamed the spirit of a generation. In Jim Morrison, critically acclaimed journalist Stephen Davis brings together insights gleaned from dozens of original interviews, long-lost recordings, and Morrison's own unpublished journals to create a vivid portrait of a misunderstood genius. 
 
Each page brims with new details on every phase of Morrison's life, from his troubled youth in a strict military household, to his coming of age in the avant-garde scene of 1960s LA, his epic alcohol and drug binges, and sexual affairs. 
 
In a gripping final chapter, Davis synthesizes new evidence recently uncovered in Paris to resolve at last many of the mysteries surrounding Morrison's death, and reconstructs the final days and hours of America's greatest rock star. Compelling and harrowing, intimate and revelatory, Jim Morrison is the definitive biography of the rock god who defined the 1960s.

Jim Morrison

Life, Death, Legend

Stuart Maconie

Cider with Roadies is the true story of a boy's obsessive relationship with pop. A life lived through music from Stuart's audience with the Beatles (aged 3); his confessions as a pubescent prog rocker; a youthful gymnastic dalliance with northern soul; the radical effects of punk on his politics, homework and trouser dimensions; playing in crap bands and failing to impress girls; writing for the NME by accident; living the sex, drugs (chiefly lager in a plastic glass) and rock and roll lifestyle; discovering the tawdry truth behind the glamour and knowing when to ditch it all for what really matters. 
 
From Stuart's four minutes in a leisure centre with MC Hammer to four days in a small van with Napalm Death it's a life-affirming journey through the land where ordinary life and pop come together to make music.

Cider With Roadies

Neil Kulkarni

Welcome to The Periodic Table of Hip Hop. Instead of hydrogen to helium, here you'll find James Brown to Kendrick Lamar - 94 artists that have defined Hip Hop arranged following the logic of The Periodic Table of Elements. 
 
MCs, DJs, rappers and producers are the elements here, and this expert guide orders them to reveal their contrasts and connections, along with key movements and moments in the history of this music genre. 
 
Includes: James Brown, P-Funk, Kool Herc, Melle Mel, Sugarhill Records, Fab Five Freddy, Whodini, Run DMC, Rick Rubin, LL Cool J, Kendrick Lamar and Jay Z and many, many more...

The Periodic Table of HIP HOP

Corey Taylor

'I was 22 years old, a hard-on with a pulse: wretched, vice-ridden, too much to burn and not enough minutes in a hour to do so' 
 
The action begins in West Des Moines, Iowa, where Corey Taylor, frontman of heavy metal bands Slipknot and Stone Sour, systematically set about committing each of the Seven Deadly Sins. He has picked fights with douche bags openly brandishing guns. He has set himself on fire at parties and woken up in dumpsters after cocaine binges. He lost his virginity at eleven. He got rich and famous and immersed himself in booze, women, and chaos until one day he realised, suddenly, that he didn't need any of that at all. 
 
Now updated with a brand new chapter, Seven Deadly Sins is a brutally honest look at 'a life that could have gone horribly wrong at any turn', and the soul-searching and self-discovery it took to set it right.

Seven Deadly Sins

Russell Watson

Russell 'The Voice' Watson is a star with a real story to tell. While most stars of today find success early, Russell was still working in a Salford factory at the age of 30. He spent the evenings singing in working men's clubs for extra cash to keep the bailiffs from his family's door. The chairman of Manchester United gave him his big break in May 1999: the opportunity to sing at Old Trafford. His extraordinary performance was quickly followed by a record deal and his phenomenal debut album. 
 
Despite his outward success, Russell struggled with his health and family life. His rapid rise to fame led to a bitter divorce from his childhood sweetheart and his private life being splashed across the tabloids. Then last year he was struck down by a life-threatening brain tumour. This plunged Russell into a deep depression and it was only the thought of leaving his two children fatherless that kept him going. Just when it seemed he was fully recovered he collapsed again while recording and had to have emergency surgery on a second brain tumour that threatened his voice, his sight and his life. 
 
Now, in his own words, Russell tells us the amazing story of his life.

Finding My Voice

Wladimir Kaminer

Born in Moscow, Wladimir Kaminer emigrated to Berlin in the early '90s when he was 22. Russian Disco is a series of short and comic autobiographical vignettes about life among the émigrés in the explosive and extraordinary multi-cultural atmosphere of '90s Berlin. It's an exotic, vodka-fuelled millennial Goodbye to Berlin. The stories show a wonderful, innocent, deadpan economy of style reminiscent of the great humorists. [Several of his European editors make a comparison with current bestseller David Sedaris.] Kaminer manages to say a great deal without seeming to say much at all. He speaks about the offbeat personal events of his own life but captures something universal about our disjointed times.

Russian Disco

John Shearlaw

Crispin Aubrey

This is the remarkable story of how the Glastonbury Festival, that started as a party in a Somerset field in the 1970s, went on to become one of the world's most famous music festivals. 
 
The tales are told in the words of everyone involved with the festival, from Michael and Emily Eavis and Arabella Churchill to Glastonbury village residents and local policemen. There is also a wealth of celebrity contributions: we hear from David Bowie, Normal Cook, Fran Healy, Chris Martin, Billy Bragg and John Peel, to name just a few. 
 
 It adds up to a fascinating slice of popular history, telling the full story of this much loved festival.

Glastonbury

‘If it’s me and your granny on bongos, it’s The Fall.’ 
 
As legendary frontman of post-punk outfit The Fall, Mark E. Smith was known as much for his mercurial temperament as his exceptional musical talent. Famous for his singular way with words both onstage and off, his road to the music hall of fame was paved with brilliant one-liners, eccentric behaviour, and the dozens of members of The Fall he ejected along the way. 
 
Collecting his wit and wisdom for the first time and featuring an introduction from Stuart Maconie, Messing Up the Paintwork is a tribute to a musical icon described as ‘untouchably cool’ (Lauren Laverne), an ‘uncompromising musical maverick’ (Tim Burgess) and ‘a man shouting from a prison window’ (Frank Skinner). And it’s a book for the fans who will miss him terribly.

Messing Up the Paintwork

The Wit and Wisdom of Mark E. Smith

Josie da Bank

Rob da Bank

Get wild. Get messy. 'Dad dance' like no one’s watching. Nourish your body and mind. Let go of the reins and the routines. Make memories and have some serious fun. 
 
From the co-founders of the award-winning family festival, Camp Bestival at Home is the perfect handbook for parents who want to bring the magical ethos of the festival home. 
 
Packed with activities, recipes and ideas to keep the whole family inspired all year round, why not get back to nature and stargaze. For kids with endless energy, you could organise a kitchen disco or put on a show. Go foraging, learn circus skills and face painting, or make festive decorations. And relax after all the activity with a family feast, plus some yoga for the grown-ups. 
 
Written and illustrated by Camp Bestival co-founders Josie and Rob da Bank, with contributions from celebrity friends and festival regulars Fatboy Slim, Sara Cox, Sophie Ellis-Bextor, Fearne Cotton and Jo Whiley.

Camp Bestival at Home

Have a Family Festival Every Day

Sarah Harding

Sunday Times Bestseller 
 
'I can't rewrite history; all I can do is be honest and wear my heart on my sleeve. It's really the only way I know. I want to show people the real me. Or perhaps remind them. Because, somewhere - amongst the nightclubs, the frocks and hairdos, the big chart hits, and the glamour of being a popstar - the other Sarah Harding got utterly lost. She's the one who's been forgotten. And all I want is for you to hear her out.' 
 
Sarah Harding is best known as the wild member of Girls Aloud, whose reputation for partying, drinking and dating made her a tabloid favourite. But where does the celebrity Sarah Harding end and the real Sarah begin? 
 
Faced with a devastating cancer diagnosis that turned her life upside down, Sarah has decided that now is the time to write her story. Her truth. 
 
This is Sarah Harding in her own words.

Hear Me Out

Mackenzie Crook

What if you had the chance to tell your hero just how much they meant to you? 
 
If Nick Drake came to my house 
and knocked upon the door 
I’m sure I’d be more happy 
than I’ve ever been before… 
 
In If Nick Drake Came to My House, Mackenzie Crook – the creator of Detectorists and Worzel Gummidge – explores the power of art to impact our lives, expressed through verse and image depicting an imaginary visit from the late, great singer-songwriter. A tender homage to a classic book by Joan Gale Thomas, Crook’s first book for adults is infused with his characteristic warm humour, both in the short yet powerful story and his own beautiful illustrations. It’s a book for anyone who has ever wished they had the chance to tell their hero how much they meant to them.

If Nick Drake Came to My House

Chrissie Hynde

By the time she was 14, Chrissie Hynde knew she had to get out of Akron, Ohio. Her perfect ’50s American childhood upturned by a newly acquired taste for rock ’n’ roll, motorbikes and the ‘get down boys’ seen at gigs in and around Cleveland – Mitch Ryder, the Jeff Beck Group, the Velvet Underground and David Bowie among the many. 
 
Wrapped up in the Kent State University riots and getting dangerously involved in the local biker and drug scenes, she escaped - to Mexico, Canada, Paris and finally London where she caught the embryonic punk scene just in time not only to witness it first-hand, but more importantly to seize the opportunity to form her own band, the Pretenders. 
 
Iggy Pop, the Sex Pistols, the Clash, Vivienne &amp; Malcolm, Ray Davies … on every page household names mingle with small town heroes as we shift from bedroom to biker HQ; from squat to practice room; from pub gig to Top Of The Pops – the long and crooked path to stardom, and for the Pretenders, ultimately, tragedy. 
 
That Chrissie Hynde is alive to tell the tale is, by her own admission, something of a miracle. Throughout she is brutally honest, wryly humorous and always highly entertaining. She has written one of the most evocative and colourful music memoirs to be published in recent years.

Reckless

Cilla Black

Cilla Black is without doubt one of Britain's most treasured personalities. Generations have grown up with Cilla's music, TV shows, and performances. But how much do we really know about 'the girl with the bright red hair and the jet black voice'? What's It All About? is Cilla's own story, told for the first time ever. It's the story of a woman who has worked ceaselessly to stay at the top for forty years despite setbacks and personal tragedy; a life of incredible highs and terrible lows. In this deeply personal autobiography she tells her unique story in intimate and vivid detail for the very first time. This is the real Cilla Black.

What's It All About?

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