Biographies

The autobiography of a legendary swing dancer

A powerful, moving and gripping book about the lives of the men who walked on the moon, re-issued with a new preface and afterword to coincide with the fortieth anniversary of the first landing.

The final word on the world's greatest rock band, Led Zeppelin.

Madonna is the biggest female pop star in the world yet there is no serious biography of her, and no biography at all by a woman. It will take an in-depth look at how - and, more to the point, why - Madonna has reinvented herself through her twenties, thirties, forties and will no doubt do so again in her fifties.

Elsa Schiaparelli (1890-1973) was one of the leading fashion designers of the 1920s and 1930s with a flair for the unusual. This autobiography charts her rise from resident of a rat-infested apartment to designer to the stars.

This is the riveting story of Noor Inayat Khan, a descendant of an Indian prince, Tipu Sultan (the Tiger of Mysore), who became a British secret agent for SOE during World War II. Noor was one of only three women SOE agents awarded the George Cross and, under torture, revealed nothing, not even her real name.

This biography (first published in 2000 to mark the 250th anniversary of J.S. Bach's death) presents a picture of the composer that demonstrates the intimate connection between Bach's life and his music, showing how the composer's superb inventiveness pervaded his career as a musician, composer, performer, scholar, and teacher.

W.B. Yeats is widely regarded as the greatest English-language poet of the twentieth century. This new critical biography seeks to tell the story of his life as it unfolded in the various contexts in which Yeats worked as an artist and as public figure.

'When I said I was writing a book, the lads at St Helens said "Who's publishing it, Ladybird?" The cheek.' 'People have been asking me to calm down all my life and I just can't. I love it when things are a bit mental.'

Patrick Pearse was not only leader of the 1916 Easter Rising but also one of the main ideologues of the IRA. Based on new material on his childhood and underground activities, this book places him in a European context and provides an intimate account of the development of his ideas on cultural regeneration, education, patriotism and militarism.

New York Times bestselling author, Richard Miniter, joins forces with #1 New York Times bestselling co-author of American Sniper, Scott McEwen, to write the provocative true history of the most controversial and top-secret unit in the American Armed Forces, the Navy SEALs.

By the time of her death in 2003 at the age of ninety-six, Katharine Hepburn had long been an American institution. This work charts the journey by which Kathy Hepburn of Hartford, Connecticut, became the star known simply as 'Kate', dazzling audiences in the company of such luminaries as Cary Grant, Jimmy Stewart, and, Spencer Tracy.

An astute and engrossing biography from the author of Victor Hugo and Balzac.

This absorbing and award-winning biography tells the story of the tragedies and triumphs of Clara Wieck Schumann (1819-1896)-at once artist, composer, editor, teacher, wife, and mother of eight children.

Shortlisted for the NME Best Music Book Award 2018THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER'The definitive book on Bowie' The Times Dylan Jones's engrossing, magisterial biography of David Bowie is unlike any Bowie story ever written.

Revealing what made him the top man, this book includes the author's thoughts and his memories of the classic years for football fans. With familiar faces presenting their comments, it shows just what it is that makes Bill Gardner unique among the toughest and the greatest of them all.

After their 43-foot schooner was stove in by a pod of killer whales, the Robertson family spent 37 days adrift in the Pacific. With no maps, compass, or navigational instruments, and rations for only three days, they used every survival technique they could as they battled 20-foot waves, marauding sharks, thirst, starvation, and exhaustion.

Presents the story of Britain's first female professional scientist, Caroline Herschel - a true Enlightenment celebrity whose rediscovery is long overdue. This work tells the story of a woman so determined to win independence and satisfy her ambition that she moved careers and countries while chasing success.

Today we view Cezanne as a monumental figure, but during his lifetime (1839-1906), many did not understand him or his work. This title covers the days and years of this visionary who would 'astonish Paris with an apple'. It is also a complete assessment of Cezanne's influence through artistic imaginations in our own time.

This enchanting collection brings together hundreds of Winston Churchill's wittiest remarks, as a record of all that was best about this endearing, conceited, talented and wildly funny Englishman.

CEO Louis V. Gerstner Jr.'s memoir about the extraordinary turnaround of IBM and his transformation of the company into the industry leader of the computer age - the great American business story of our time.

One of the classics of prison literature, this collection of documents serves as the last will and testament of the Lutheran theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer, executed by the Nazis after incarceration in Tegel Prison

The essential biography of the Velvet Underground singer and New York legend

'You will not find a more devoted, thorough, loving and surprising book on the life of Leonard Bernstein - the most extraordinary man of extraordinary talents. Read it.' Lauren Bacall''Humphrey Burton has written a very detailed and candid account of his friend . . . The mass of material is superbly handled . . So much intelligence .

The highly acclaimed, award-winning biography of Sir Anthony Blunt - aesthete, homosexual, communist, spy.

During the second world war Eric Lomax was forced to work on the notorious Burma-Siam Railway and was tortured by the Japanese for making a crude radio. Left emotionally scarred and unable to form normal relationships Lomax suffered for years until, with the help of his wife Patti and the Medical Foundation for the Care of Victims of Torture.

In Lone Star Rising, Robert Dallek offers a brilliant, definitive portrait of a great American politician. Based on seven years of research in over 450 manuscript collections and oral histories, as well as numerous personal interviews, this first of a two-volume biography follows Johnson's life from his childhood to his election as vice-president under Kennedy.

When Abraham Verghese, a physician whose marriage is unravelling, relocates to Texas, he hopes to make a fresh start as a staff member at a county hospital.

* A unique record of one woman's experience of twenty-five of the most cataclysmic years in modern history - and a Virago Classic bestseller - with a new introduction by Mark Bostridge

The incredible story of punk rock legend and Generation X frontman Billy Idol