Showing results by publisher "Pan Macmillan Publishers Ltd." in Biographies & Memoirs

In the span of four months in 2012, Tig Notaro was hospitalized for a debilitating intestinal disease called C. diff, her mother unexpectedly died, she went through a breakup, and then she was diagnosed with bilateral breast cancer. Hit with this devastating barrage, Tig took her grief onstage. Days after receiving her cancer diagnosis, she broke new comedic ground, opening an unvarnished set with the words, 'Good evening. Hello. I have cancer. How are you? Hi, how are you? Is everybody having a good time? I have cancer.'

The purpose of this insider's account is to provide an answer to all these questions and more. Andrew Marr's brilliant, and brilliantly funny, book is a guide to those of us who read newspapers, or who listen to and watch news bulletins but want to know more. Andrew Marr tells the story of modern journalism through his own experience.

Maria Toorpakai Wazir has lived her life disguised as a boy, defying the Taliban, in order to pursue her love of sport. Coming second in a national junior weightlifting event for boys, Maria decided to put her future in her own hands by going in disguise. When she discovered squash and was easily beating all the boys, life became more dangerous.

In Not Quite World's End, John Simpson looks at the world's troubles, the Middle East, global warming, population explosion, and takes the perhaps surprising view that it's actually not nor will be the end of the world. His vivid prose, his clear-sightedness, and the wonderful anecdotes about the many strange people and places he has come across all add up to a richly satisfying read.

Following on from the huge success of the eponymous West End and Broadway play, Frost/Nixon tells the extraordinary story of how David Frost pursued and landed the biggest fish of his career. When he first conceived the idea of interviewing Richard Nixon and trying to bring the ex-president to confront his past, he was told on all sides that the project would never get off the ground.

Writing with the warmth and humour that have made her so popular, Coleen describes her eventful life, from joining her sisters' band, The Nolans, when she was only nine to growing up in the spotlight as they went on to chart-topping success around the world.

From the admiralty to the miner's strike, from the Battle of Britain to the Nobel Prize, Churchill oversaw some of the most important events the world has ever seen. Roy Jenkins faithfully presents these events, while also managing to convey the contradictions and quirks in Churchill's character.

An unprecedented personal portrait of one of the great leaders of our time, in his own words. Nelson Mandela is one of the most inspiring and iconic figures of our age. Now, after a lifetime of taking pen to paper to record thoughts and events, hardships and victories, he has opened his personal archive, which offers an unprecedented insight into his remarkable life. Conversations With Myself gives readers access to the private man behind the public figure.

From his childhood in 1950s Glasgow, when he was affectionately known to his older brothers as 'the wee bastard', to his wildnerness years as an accountant when he longed to achieve his dream and join the BBC, Tracks of My Years tells the story of Ken Bruce's remarkable career.

Eleanor Morgan's first-person account of her own struggles with anxiety was published as part of The Vice Guide to Mental Health and was read by five million people across 15 countries within four days. Anxiety for Beginners will serve as a guide for those who live with anxiety disorders and those who live with them by proxy.

On November 13th 2001, John Simpson and a BBC news crew walked into Kabul, and the liberation of the Afghan capital was broadcast to a waiting world. It was the end of a sustained campaign against the Taliban, a campaign that Simpson had covered from the beginning, despite appalling difficulties and, often, great danger. In this, his third riveting volume of autobiography, John Simpson focuses on how journalists set about finding the stories that make the headlines.

This riveting and important book is the summation of more than 20 years covering Saddam Hussein's Iraq. The War Against Saddam offers, in five acts, the full story of his rise to power and the West's relationship with Saddam throughout his dictatorship.

In the spring of 1939, with the Second World War looming, two determined 24-year-olds, Heather Jenner and Mary Oliver, decided to open a marriage bureau. They found a tiny office on London's Bond Street and set about the delicate business of matchmaking. Drawing on the bureau's extensive archives, Penrose Halson - who, many years later, found herself the proprietor of the bureau - tells their story and the stories of their clients. We meet a remarkable cross section of British society in the 1940s.

Spitfire Ace provides a vivid portrait of the few that flew in the Battle of Britain. The battle, in 1940, was one of the most famous air battles in the history of warfare. It is a story of ruthless organisation, and brilliant control and command. And at its heart is a legendary figure, the RAF fighter pilot, and one particular plane, a piece of machinery of almost mythic historical glamour: the Supermarine Spitfire.

At 22 Julie Barton collapsed on her kitchen floor in Manhattan. She was one year out of college and severely depressed. Summoned by Julie's incoherent phone call, her mother raced from Ohio to New York and took her home. Psychiatrists, therapists and family tried to intervene, but nothing reached her until the day she decided to do one hopeful thing: adopt a golden retriever puppy she named Bunker.

William Shatner gets the joke about William Shatner. In fact, most of the time he's the one telling it. His self-effacing attitude, so perfectly parodied in the bombastic character he now plays on Boston Legal, is one of the reasons for his huge popularity. While best known for his creation of Captain James T. Kirk, William Shatner has been a working actor for more than half a century. As funny, charming, and self-deprecating as the man himself, this book will delight his fans of all ages.

'People may say I can't sing. But no one can ever say I didn't sing.' Despite having no pitch, no rhythm and no tone, Florence Foster Jenkins became one of America's best-known sopranos, giving a sell-out concert at Carnegie Hall. Born in Pennsylvania in 1868, Florence Foster adored music and as a girl was a talented pianist, but her wealthy father refused to allow her to study in Europe. In retaliation she eloped with Dr Frank Jenkins, but the marriage soon foundered, not least because the 18-year-old bride contracted syphilis on their wedding night.