The autobiography used to be the preserve of the great and good – people who had actually made an impact and had something to say. In recent years, however, it seems an appearance on a reality show is enough to warrant someone penning their life story. Needless to say, all autobiographies are not created equal. As a voracious reader, I have consumed hundreds of autobiographies over the years. It is one of my favourite genres as I feel you can learn a lot from studying other people and their highs and lows. That said, there are some I have finished which left me scratching my head, wondering why they bothered putting their uninspiring lives on paper. Even worse are the autobiographies that read like a 400-page press release.
A good autobiography should really feel like the person is speaking to you. It should be vulnerable and honest – not controlled and glossy. Because life is messy, and no one believes anyone who claims they have had nothing but great experiences. When you finish it, you should feel like you know something more about the person and have had an intimate conversation with them. They don’t have to include shocking revelations, but they do at least need to feel authentic. And many don’t. That said, some of it also comes down to personal taste and interests – if you’re not a football fan, you are not going to enjoy a player’s autobiography. So I have kept this list to tomes that simply don’t do what an autobiography should, irrespective of who wrote it. I have also restricted it to contemporary books rather than historical ones.
5. Karma – Boy George (2023)
This is not a bad book, which I appreciate, but it sounds contradictory. However my issue with it was that it was Boy George’s second autobiography and his first Take It Like A Man (1995) was iconic. It was the pithiest, bitchiest and funniest autobiography I had ever read. He was indiscreet but not vulgar, and you really felt like you knew him after reading it. He didn’t hold back as he discussed his addiction, recovery, time in prison, love affairs, crushes and rise to fame, and by the time I finished it, I just wanted to have a cup of tea with him and give him a hug.
Fast forward almost 30 years when he is enjoying a career resurgance after an appearance on I’m a Celebrity…Get Me Out Of Here, and he released Karma – not so much a follow-up as a rewriting. He covers all the old ground again – as well as everything that happened afterwards – but it just fell flat for me. I had been very excited for this after his first book, but this offering felt like it had been written by his PR, and it didn’t feel nearly as authentic. If you want to get an insight into the real George O’Dowd, I recommend his first book.
4. Ulrika Jonsson – Honest (2003)
This book makes the list simply because it didn’t live up to the title. Even if you are not a fan, everyone is familiar with this one because it kick-started a chain of events that destroyed the career of John Leslie. Ulrika claimed an unnamed television presenter had raped her earlier in her television career and, as you would expect, she got headlines galore. There was huge speculation about who the presenter was, and then Leslie was named on television by the presenter Matthew Wright, who later apologised and said he had named him in error.
The apology was too little too late as his career went into freefall and Ulrika sat silently by refusing to confirm or deny if it was him. He has always denied he was her attacker, but the whiff of scandal led other women to come out of the woodwork and led to a public feeding frenzy that seemed determined to pick the bones of his life clean. While Leslie may or may not be a flawed individual, the way Ulrika seemed to relish in the publicity her silence brought just felt very distasteful. The sad part is that she has had quite an interesting life and had a lot to say without including the rape anecdote. All it served to do was distract from what could have been a good read.
3. Anthea Turner – Fools Rush In (2000)
If you haven’t already had the “delight” of reading this, I would suggest you run, don’t walk, as far away from it as you can. If moon dust and candy floss had a baby, it would be this. It is so saccharin, and I’m surprised I didn’t get diabetes reading it. I probably should have expected that from someone who famously used their wedding to endorse a chocolate bar. I’ve never interviewed Anthea, but she always comes across as very sweet and nice. And this book ramps that up to a million.
It was ghostwritten by romance writer Wendy Holden, and boy, does it show. She breathlessly took the reader through her life – including Cadburygate. It just all turned out to be rather uninteresting and felt very contrived. It had been billed as he “forthright, emotive and inspiring account of the life of a great survivor on planet fame”. The problem with that is she hasn’t really survived anything (except Cadburygate – always worth mentioning that again because it was so ludicrous). And the most inspiring thing I can think of that she did was create Thunderbirds Tracy Island from loo rolls and sticky back plastic, saving parents a fortune on the shop-bought version. Ultimately, I learned nothing about her that wasn’t in the public domain and needed my blood sugar checked after finishing it.
Katie Price – Being Jordan: (2004) , A Whole New World (2006), Pushed to the Limit (2008), You Only Live Once (2010), Love, Lipstick and Lies (2013), Reborn (2016), Katie Price: Harvey and Me (2021), This Is Me: The high life. The dark times. The FULL story (2024)
I will confess I have not read the last two books on this list, but since they are part of the Katie Price encyclopedia, and one must assume more of the same, I have included them, as I have read the others. I don’t have enough of a word count here to go into exactly why they are so bad. But one of the key things about an autobiography is that you should learn something new about the subject. Every book of Katie’s I have read feels like a regurgitation of things that are already common knowledge.
Admittedly, they sell ridiculously well, but they scream “fast buck”. I find it completely ludicrous that she has eight autobiographies, especially when they are badly written and don’t give you any new information. For context, national treasure Helen Mirren, 33 years older than Katie, with a stellar career, has one autobiography. The irony is that if Katie didn’t rely on being tabloid fodder to make a living, she would have some interesting stories to tell
1. Spare – Prince Harry (2023)
This is one of those rare things – an autobiography I couldn’t finish. I usually subscribe to the Magnus Magnusson school of “I’ve started so I’ll finish” as no matter how bad something is, there is generally a redeeming feature. But I had to give up on this one because Harry’s “hard done by” whiny rhetoric was honestly exhausting. “Recollections may vary indeed, but this all felt like a pathetic attempt to throw his family under the bus. He took no ownership of his actions – everything was someone else’s fault. Clearly, all the therapy he claimed he had been doing wasn’t working.
He also felt the need to drag former fling Sasha Walpole into proceedings, outing her as the woman who took his virginity. I say fling, but by her own admission, it was a five-minute romp in a field behind a busy pub. Sasha, who now works driving a digger, is an ordinary person, not part of society cliques, and she suddenly found herself the subject of intense media and public scrutiny. Admittedly, he didn’t name her, but he made sure she was recognisable. The book was clearly designed to cause carnage rather than be a riveting read, and in that, Harry succeeded.