Memoirs & Personal Stories Books

What happens at your kitchen table can become the blueprint for everything you are. Did you sit alone or with people you loved? Was it fun or tense? Was someone working hard to stop you noticing someone else's mood? Did you take i…

It’s 1996, and Jeremy, a young American, has met the British boy of his dreams — just as, amid a media frenzy, US Congress prepares the Defense of Marriage Act, denying same-sex couples rights including immigration. The pair snatc…

The incredible first memoir from the Booker-winning radical icon Arundhati Roy, author of The God of Small ThingsTHE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLERSHORTLISTED FOR WATERSTONES BOOK OF THE YEAR 2025SHORTLISTED FOR THE WOMENS PRIZE FOR NONF…

Kathy Burke is one of Britain's most distinctive voices. Even as a fearless kid in Islington, she did things her own way; roaming the estate that raised her to find her own path.A place at the Anna Scher Theatre in her teens chang…

An honest, moving and long-awaited memoir from Academy Award-winning actor Sir Anthony Hopkins. Growing up in the small Welsh town of Port Talbot, Sir Anthony Hopkins struggled in school and was deemed by his peers and parents to …

At twenty-six, Cheryl Strayed thought she had lost everything. In the wake of her mother's rapid death from cancer, her family disbanded and her marriage crumbled. With nothing to lose, she made the most impulsive decision of her …

Growing up in the 90s in a small town in Indiana, Kevin James Thornton had little notion he would one day make a career as a comedian. Like most kids in his deeply Christian town, his free time revolved around his church community…

How do we go on when a loved one betrays us?On a chilly day in March of 2020, in the early days of the pandemic, Belle Burden s husband of twenty years announced, with no prior warning, that he was leaving her.His decision shocked…

‘The one thing you can’t fully control in a ship is the water all around you, so part of your plan is always reading and analysing the currents and the tides. You have a clear image in your head of how you think the ship will perf…

In 2017, Hannah Murray was a successful actor whose career had taken her to Hollywood and given her the opportunity to act with A list stars and Oscar-winning directors. But as the daily costs of acting grew, from the degradations…

Mark Ronson was born a night person. With hedonistic creatives for parents, parties became his playground. Yet, having moved to New York City from London at a young age, he always felt like a bit of an outsider, until discovering …

With his trademark wit, candour and relentlessly perceptive eye, Edmund White, the beloved 85-year-old ‘paterfamilias of queer literature’ (New York Times) delves unflinchingly into the aspect of his life which has inspired so man…

The long-awaited, candid memoir by Priscilla Presley chronicling her difficult, inspiring journey beyond the walls of Graceland and behind the elegant image the world sees. The Elvis legacy seen from the inside ...Priscilla Presle…

Sociopath: A Memoir is the astoundingly honest true story of a life lived on the edge of the law, and a fascinating account of one woman’s battle to understand her diagnosis. Jaw-dropping, moving and illuminating, it will challeng…

It's 3 a.m. and Elizabeth Gilbert is sobbing on the bathroom floor. She's in her thirties, she has a husband, a house, they're trying for a baby - and she doesn't want any of it.A bitter divorce and a turbulent love affair later, …

Everything good, bad and downright mad that has shaped Vogue’s life and career is laid bare in Big Mouth. So get ready for sharply observed, hilarious and very personal insights into divorce, anxiety, family life, and showbiz, alo…

Father's Day, 2005. Just after nightfall, a discarded husband was driving his three young sons back to their mother's house. On that dark country road, barely five minutes from home, the old white car swerved off the highway and p…

An unflinching memoir about growing up in Iran where homosexuality is punishable by death, and yet underground, hidden from Sharia law, is a vibrant gay scene threatening to burst open. The dawn prayer calls echo through the stree…

The fascinating new memoir from one of Ireland's most celebrated and singular broadcastersI started writing this book as an exclusively work memoir but the work and the personal kept overlapping. I don’t know if that’s because I’m…

Sarah Perry’s father-in-law David died in the autumn of 2022, only nine days after a cancer diagnosis. He was in some ways a very ordinary man: he loved stamp collecting, fish and chips, comic novels and his local church.Yet as Sa…

DR HARRY BARRY's life and career has been shaped by defining events: a solitary childhood with chronic illness, a traumatic experience in school, and family tragedies that set him on a course of dedicating his life to medicine and…

Katriona O'Sullivan has come a long way from the poverty, chaos and abuse she knew growing up. A respected academic and bestselling author, she defied every expectation placed on the teenage mother she once was.Yet even as the acc…

Lesley Bond and her partner Gordon were the first couple to embark on the six-month caretaking residency on the Great Blasket Island, one of Ireland’s most remote and historically rich locations. With no electricity, hot wat…

In this rowdy, frank reflection on illness, fame, sex, and everything in between, the remarkable mind behind the hit series Girls and the bestselling author of Not That Kind of Girl asks whether fulfilling her creative ambitions h…

From one of America's iconic writers, a portrait of a marriage and a life - in good times and bad - that will speak to anyone who has ever loved a husband or wife or child. A stunning book of electric honesty and passion. Several …

Bernard Phelan was working for an Iranian tour operator when he was arrested on false charges of spying on 3rd October 2022, becoming a political hostage. He shared "Satan's block" in Mashhad prison with political prisoners and dr…

'Since I’ve had my first book published, I’ve earned more from cleaning than from writing. The home economics don’t add up.' Between 2015 and 2021 Caitríona Lally published her first two novels, Eggshells and Wunderland. To buy he…

Joe Tucker's Uncle Eric was a beloved yet unconventional figure throughout his life.A shambolically dressed man who lived with his mother for almost eighty years, he appeared to exist only for daily trips to the bookie - and yet h…

From declaring my love to Vanessa Redgrave to being fed cockroaches by Steve Buscemi, from turnip-based comedy with Blackadder to being farted on by Arnold Schwarzenegger, from Graham Norton's sofa to Alan Cumming's camper van, my…

Throughout LGBTQ+ history, suburbia has been seen as somewhere to escape from: a place where heterosexuality rules; where difference will not be tolerated; where you'll never find a soulmate. But for many, those streets of twitchi…