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London Made Us

A Memoir of a Shape-Shifting City

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London Made Us

By: Robert Elms
Narrated by: Robert Elms
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'London is a giant kaleidoscope, which is forever turning. Take your eye off it for more than a moment and you’re lost.’

Robert Elms has seen his beloved city change beyond all imagining. London in his lifetime has morphed from a piratical, still bomb-scarred playground, to a swish cosmopolitan metropolis. Motorways driven through lost communities, murder miles becoming estate agents' dreams, accents changing, towers appearing. Yet still it remains to him the greatest place on earth.

Elms takes us back through time and place to myriad Londons. He is our guide through a place that has seen scientific experiments conducted in subterranean lairs, a small community declare itself an independent nation and animals of varying exoticism roam free through its streets; a place his great-great-grandfather made the Elms’ home over a century ago and a city that has borne witness to epoch- and world-changing events.

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Critic reviews

"London Made Us is a marvellously detailed and wonderfully evocative memoir of London trembling on the border of extinction. Our tears and dreams are made of this" (PETER ACKROYD)
"This great city of ours has been truly blessed with some notable social and historical chroniclers . . . Robert Elms is a worthy addition in my humble opinion. This book will quite literally give the reader, whether London-born or not, the most fascinating in-depth history lesson of my beloved city (warts an’ all) to date. The reading of this book should be made a compulsory addition to the curriculum of every state and private school in the capital" (NORMAN JAY MBE)
"[Robert Elms'] observations are fresh, incisive and sometimes revelatory . . . His love of his city shines from every page"
"A love letter to the capital . . . Part memoir, part cultural history, it sees him embarking on a voyage through the London of his youth and that of his forebears while assessing the city of today . . . He offers warm and often vivid snapshots of the capital of the '60s and '70s"
"Robert Elms's bright, sparky, self-aware homage to his home . . . Elms writes as he speaks . . . His voice surfs on waves of sentimental passion and it, too, conjures up a vanishing world"
"This is a freewheeling book that revels in the tales it tells – and it tells plenty . . . A delight"
"A celebration of [London’s] utterly vital past, and a stinging critique of present pseudo-posh . . . Elms is good at taking a little piece of our hearts . . . But he gives, too. His stories are funny and memorable"
All stars
Most relevant
An enjoyable ramble about town with more than one eye on the historical detail, of the place

An engaging and compelling listen

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I can’t recommend highly enough.
This is my London too - many of the same faces names haunts and pleasures.
Robert Elms hits a perfect pitch - avoiding nostalgia and describing places in time perfectly.
Bravo.

Perfectly pitched ….. absolutely brilliant.

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Excellent history of London, covering lots of aspects. I would highly recommend even as a Geordie.

Really Enjoyable!

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This is the most fabulous memoir of a talented man in so many ways. Having lived in the same area of NW London, I whole heartedly agree with his brilliant descriptions of the old and the new. The carefree times through the 60s, 70s etc. and how the the present day compares is written by a knowledgeable wordsmith. Even if you don’t live in London, it’s a great read and it will stir up some memories you lived through or heard about.

LONDON MADE US- it certainly reminded me of the good and not so good London.

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If you're a Londoner or a Greater Londoner of a similar age, this book will bring the memories flooding back.

A great listen,

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