Simon Callow has spent the past 25 years reliving the life of Orson Welles, his idol and inspiration. It has been a full-time occupation: this is his third substantial volume recording it. Welles, he says, 'packed more living into his life, pursued more professions, thrust out in more directions than any 20 men put together'.
NEW FICTION
- MUST READS Look up at the sky, and see the white vapour lines and crosses of a plane's path.
- LITERARY FICTION Forty-year-old Sam Tahar has 'rid himself of his past like a murderer'.
- HISTORICAL FICTION Pulitzer Prize-winning Brooks has written a compelling novel.
- POPULAR FICTION Quentin Letts' knowledge of Westminster is put to good use.
- THRILLERS A sort of sequel - or, at least, a parallel - to Nesbo's bestseller Blood On Snow.
- DEBUT FICTION Poet John Milton was buried in St Giles Cripplegate in 1674.
- CHILDREN'S FICTION Boyne returns to Nazi Germany in this affecting morality tale.
THIS WEEK'S PAPERBACKS
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One man's incredible will to survive: Adrift in the Pacific for 14 months, fisherman caught seabirds with his bare hands, chewed driftwood - and ate his fingernails
One day in November 2012, a fisherman called Salvador Alvarenga made a fateful decision to ignore bad weather warnings and head out to sea regardless in his 25 ft fibreglass boat. He had no idea that he'd be stuck at sea for the next 438 days - and that he'd have to eat his own beard and fingernails to survive.
LITERARY NEWS
- Adrian Mole author Sue Townsend, 68, dies at her home in Leicester after a stroke
- New chapter in the history of the Bronte birthplace as new owners turn it into a cafe honouring the family's literary heritage
- Nobel laureate Gabriel Garcia Marquez, author of One Hundred Years of Solitude, hospitalised with lung and urinary tract infections
- You don't need sex to sell! Dan Brown's Inferno tops Amazon best-seller list for 2013 as readers look for different thrills after Fifty Shades trilogy
Shameless lothario who taught Elvis how to drive women wild: The record producer who opened the floodgates of rock talent
The body of Elvis Presley was lying on view in an open coffin at his home, Graceland, in Memphis, Tennessee, in August 1977, when a man in his mid-50s stepped forward. With long, wavy hair and a beard, and looking like a general from the American Civil War, he bent over, tapped Elvis gently on the cheek and told him he loved him. He had reason to. He was Sam Phillips, the record producer who, 24 years earlier, had discovered the singer, and in so doing had not only ignited Elvis's extraordinary life, but his own, too - while justifying the title of this book along the way.