It’s time to share readers’ thoughts on the latest Mirror Book Club read...
Blowing The Bloody Doors Off And Other Lessons In Life
Michael Caine
The legendary actor shares everything he’s learned during 60 years of highs and lows since his film debut.
He has earned two Oscars and made undisputed classics from Get Carter to The Italian Job and here he extols old-fashioned virtues such as hard work, punctuality, learning your craft and respecting others.
He illustrates his point with entertaining anecdotes and pays affectionate tribute to the people who have meant most to him, from Laurence Olivier to Jack Nicholson.
His love for his family shines like a beacon and he also writes movingly about the challenges of ageing.
This is a little thin compared to previous Caine memoirs but there is enough charm and wit to make it thoroughly engaging.
BY ALLAN HUNTER
Hodder & Stoughton, £8.99
The Spy And The Traitor
Ben McIntyre
The popular historian tells the story of Oleg Gordievsky, the KGB colonel who was Russia’s top man until 1973 when he began covertly working for MI6.
Did he switch sides because he saw the Western light or because he was an attention seeker?
Although our spy lacks an engaging personality, you can rely on Macintyre to tease out the fascinating details.
BY JOHN LEWIS-STEMPEL
Penguin, £8.99
How To Be A Footballer
Peter Crouch
Former England striker Crouch casts a wry eye over the “strangest, funniest, most baffling world” of football and its players.
There are outlandish outfits and tattoo sleeves, bizarre rituals and mind-boggling extravagances.
He’s relatively indiscreet, pokes gleeful fun at himself and shares thoughtful insights. But, above all, he’s hilarious with endless laugh-out-loud anecdotes.
BY CHARLOTTE HEATHCOTE
Ebury Press, £8.99
Erebus: The Story Of A Ship
Michael Palin
Everyone’s favourite Python tells the story of Erebus in his cheery prose style. The iron-clad warship voyaged far into Antarctica but is best remembered as the vessel that made a doomed search for the Northwest Passage, the holy grail of Victorian exploration.
It was trapped by ice in 1846 and the crew sought in vain to stay alive by eating each other.
BY JOHN LEWIS-STEMPEL
Arrow, £8.99
In A House Of Lies
Ian Rankin
The skeleton of a private detective who disappeared a decade ago is discovered amid evidence that the investigating cops were incompetent at best, or corrupt and even complicit at worst.
And that includes Rebus.
The retired detective also has fun baiting his old nemesis Big Ger Cafferty, the terrifying godfather of Edinburgh crime. An enjoyable, emotionally compelling novel.
BY JAKE KERRIDGE
Orion, £7.99
