Rock Stars Stole My Life by Mark Ellen review – misty-eyed, touchingly nerdy memoir

From the mud and thunder of early festivals to Live Aid and Rihanna, music journalist Mark Ellen was usually in the right place at the right timeMark Ellen surveys the happy youngsters comfortably cavorting at Glastonbury, marvelling at Primal Scream beneath a harvest moon. “You bastards,” moans the music journalist and editor, recalling his nascent festival experiences in the early 1970s, of trench foot, scurvy and Van der Graaf Generator. “You don’t know how lucky you are.”Still, there’s a misty-eyed reverence for the past in Ellen’s entertaining memoir of five decades surrounded by music – which is to be expected. This, after all, is the man who launched Mojo magazine after realising there was a potential readership who liked music that was “magical and built to last”. For Ellen, the magic began with the discovery of the Beatles and the Kinks, Small Faces and Chicken Shack. Like a character from Jonathan Coe’s novel The Rotters’ Club, his comfortable 60s and 70s adolescence discussing the meaning of prog is ditched for a squat in Battersea, where he begins to pen florid gig reviews for Record Mirror and NME.  Continue reading... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'

[ The Guardian | 2015-03-29 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Book Review: Behold, America: A History of America First and the American Dream, by Sarah Churchwell

In the late summer of 1941, as millions of Americans were debating whether to become involved in the war against Hitler, the journalist Dorothy Thompson wrote a celebrated essay for Harper's magazine. The title was Who Goes Nazi?, and Thompson explained that she had devised "a somewhat macabre... Continue reading at Stuff

[ Stuff | 2018-07-07 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The book trade's Rising Stars of 2018 revealed

The annual list of the book trade’s next generation features a number of youngsters who are already right at the heart of the contemporary book trade. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2018-07-07 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Industry Notes: Zuiker Press’ Issue-Based Graphic Novels; Sweden’s Thunderful Publishing and Rising Star

The creator of television's 'CSI' franchise and his wife create a new series of teen-told tales as graphic novels, Simon & Schuster distributing. And Sweden's still young Thunderful Publishing has a new acquisition in Rising Star Games. The post Industry Notes: Zuiker Press’ Issue-Based... Continue reading at Publishing Perspectives

[ Publishing Perspectives | 2018-07-05 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Review: Boots Riley's 'Sorry to Bother You' is an arrestingly surreal satire on class rage and cultural identity

The title treatment for “Sorry to Bother You,” Boots Riley’s joyous dystopian cackle of a directing debut, has more personality than most movies. Designed by the children’s book illustrator J. Otto Seibold in a blocky original font — let’s call it “Dinosaur Tetris” — it conquers the screen in big... Continue reading at Los Angeles Times

[ Los Angeles Times | 2018-07-05 00:00:00 UTC ]
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W&N scoops Faber Academy graduate's 'touching' Japanese debut

W&N has acquired Faber Academy graduate Stephanie Scott's Tokyo-set debut, The Sentence. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2018-07-03 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Face Up Mid-Year Review: Our Favorite Magazine Covers of 2018 (So Far)

As the Fourth of July arrives each year, it brings with it many traditions—cheap beer, grilled hot dogs, and quasi-illegal fireworks, to name a few—but it also provides an opportunity at the year's half-way point to reflect on just what's gone on over the last six months. And there is perhaps no... Continue reading at Folio Magazine

[ Folio Magazine | 2018-07-03 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Canongate signs 'remarkably courageous' memoir on illness

Canongate is to publish a "remarkably courageous and highly topical" memoir by Porochista Khakpour entitled Sick. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2018-06-30 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Bush and Winterson to star in 2018's Bradford Literature Festival

Musician-writer Kate Bush, novelist Jeanette Winterson and former boxer Frank Bruno are among those participating in the Bradford Literature Festival 2018, in association with Provident Financial Group, where over 500 speakers will feature across more than 400 sessions. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2018-06-29 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Model spiders to mark 20 years of The Chamber of Secrets

Seven models of the spiders from Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets will be unveiled across the UK at the end of the month to mark the novel’s 20th anniversary. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2018-06-29 00:00:00 UTC ]
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'Unflinching' Deborah Orr memoir to W&N

Weidenfeld & Nicolson has pre-empted a "sharp" and "unflinching" memoir by journalist Deborah Orr, exploring her relationship with her mother that resulted in a diagnosis of Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2018-06-29 00:00:00 UTC ]
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MIT Technology Review Redesigns for the Greater Good

One of many memorable covers in the long history of MIT Technology Review's various iterations arrived in October of 2012 in the form of a close-up portrait of Apollo 11 moonwalker Buzz Aldrin above the tagline, "You promised me Mars colonies. Instead, I got Facebook." Six years later, we still... Continue reading at Folio Magazine

[ Folio Magazine | 2018-06-28 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Dodgers' Matt Kemp moves into second place among outfielders in voting for National League All-Star team

A Dodgers outfielder who was acquired primarily as a cost-cutting move last winter appears destined to start the July 17 All-Star game at Washington. Matt Kemp moved past Bryce Harper of the Nationals and into second place in voting among National League outfielders on Monday. With 10 days left... Continue reading at Los Angeles Times

[ Los Angeles Times | 2018-06-26 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Graphic novelist sentenced to life in prison for 2016 torture and murder of his fiancee

A graphic novelist who once had a fledgling Hollywood career was sentenced Tuesday to life in prison for the brutal torture killing of his fiancee — a murder prosecutors say took cues from a gory book he worked on years earlier. Blake Leibel, 37, was convicted last week of the 2016 slaying of... Continue reading at Los Angeles Times

[ Los Angeles Times | 2018-06-26 00:00:00 UTC ]
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'NYRB' Plummets, 'Paris Review' Creeps Upward On 2017 VIDA Count

According to the annual VIDA Count, which analyzes gender parity at literary magazines, only 23.3% of pieces published in the 'New York Review of Books' last year were written by women, while representation at the 'Paris Review' crept up by 8 percentage points in the year. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2018-06-18 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Canongate to livestream 'Twin Peaks' marathon to mark David Lynch publication

Canongate is to mark the global publication of filmmaker David Lynch’s "highly anticipated" memoir, Room to Dream, with a marathon "Twin Peaks" viewing session. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2018-06-16 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Book review: Finding by David Hill

I was astonished to find that I have read 46 of David Hill's books (plus 14 short stories and four poems); I have even heard his words read at a funeral. Yet none of these brought me more pleasure than his latest novel. Continue reading at Stuff

[ Stuff | 2018-06-16 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Amazon comes under fire for removal of book reviews

Amazon has come under fire for removing reviews from its online book listings, with some customers having had all their reviews removed or being blocked from posting further reviews. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2018-06-15 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Julia Roberts to star in Amazon Chris Cleave adaptation

Julia Roberts is set to star in an Amazon Studios adaptation of Chris Cleave’s 2008 novel The Other Hand (Sceptre), known in the US as Little Bee. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2018-06-15 00:00:00 UTC ]
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With Crashed Pence Bio, Macmillan Turns Its Eye to a 'Shadow President'

A new investigative biography of Vice President Mike Pence, 'The Shadow President,' will be released this August by St. Martin's Press. It is the latest in big-name political books from Macmillan, which has released two other marquee politics titles this year. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2018-06-15 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Living an Unexpected Life: PW Talks to Christine Caine

Christine Caine is following up on her 2016 bestseller ‘Unashamed’ with a reflection on life’s unpredictable events and resilient faith in ‘Unexpected.’ Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2018-06-13 00:00:00 UTC ]
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