Nicholas Shakespeare was born in 1957. The son of a diplomat, much of his youth was spent in the Far East and South America. His books have been translated into twenty-two languages. They include The Vision of Elena Silves (winner of the Somerset Maugham Award), Snowleg, The Dancer Upstairs, Inheritance, Priscilla and Six Minutes in May. He has been longlisted for the Booker Prize twice, was a Visiting Fellow at All Souls College, Oxford and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.
Written with Fleming-esque brio and insouciance, with a feeling for
the tragic aspects of his life as well as the ironic comedy of
it..elegant...the research here is impeccable.
*Telegraph*
This excellent biography is as worldly and clever as one could
wish.
*Spectator*
Magisterial.... Shakespeare knows Fleming’s world intimately and
the intricate portrait of this complex individual is
unsurpassable.
*Daily Express, Books of the Year*
Elegant and painstakingly researched
*Observer*
A monumental record of Fleming’s life. The completeness of the book
is beyond doubt. Shakespeare leaves no future biographer much to
discover. Fleming’s place in history is assured.
*Sunday Times*
A sustained and engrossing homage to the Olympic icon of a
beleaguered Britain, and a writer damned to fame. With scarcely a
dull page, it’s a chip off the old block... steeped in exceptional
research....stitches up the loose ends of Fleming’s story into a
satisfying 21st-century biography.
*Independent*
This is a marvellous book about Ian Fleming, but it's also one of
the most engaging portraits of a particular period of British
history that I have read in a long time
*Antonia Fraser*
A must-read
*Evening Standard*
A definitive biography that deepens and reshapes previous versions
of Fleming’s life… light-footed and swift-moving despite its
copious research… Shakespeare’s Fleming rises from these richly
textured pages as a more substantial and sympathetic figure than
the preening snob of myth.
*Financial Times*
The Complete Man is packed with women, their characters and stories
carefully filled in...highly accomplished and readable
*New Statesman*
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