Annie Lennox:: The Biography

by Bryony Sutherland, Lucy Ellis (Contributor)

The definitive biography of the Scottish singer who graduated from The Tourists to The Eurythmics and went on to international solo stardom. From Love is a Stranger through Diva to the reformed Eurythmics 1999 album Peace, this is the revealing story of an extraordinary female singer.

Genres: Music, Biography

456 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 2001

About the author

Bryony Sutherland is a biographer, ghostwriter and editor of memoirs and fiction ... with a twist.

She is the co-author of a number of celebrity biographies and ghostwritten novels with Lucy Ellis. Together they have been called "professional storytellers" by The Guardian, "very professional" by Film Review, "immensely readable" by The Beat Goes On, "detailed" by Sunday Express and "insightful" by OK! Magazine.

Bryony's most recent collaboration, Being Biracial: Where Our Secret Worlds Collide with Sarah Ratliff, is an anthology of essays from authors all over the globe, exploring how being more than one ethnicity affects identity. For more information, please visit http://beingbiracial.com.

Reviews

[Wendy Sice · Rating 3 out of 5]

This as a hard slog of a book which probably would have been better as a memoir than a biography. It is waaaaay too long-winded, and although I learnt some interesting things about Annie Lennox’s life, I felt a bit like a voyeur reading about her intimate relationships and personality flaws.

The writers were obviously obsessed with Annie, analysing every song, video and concert ever created, in detail, often with harsh criticism. I guess it is, at least, not sugary sweet and accepting of all her musical creations, but no artist truly wants to read a bad review so I can’t imagine Annie enjoying reading this book. Her personality was laid bare too, exposing every annoying aspect as well as the good, but ultimately portraying her as a difficult, angsty individual with a sting in her tail.

It took me a long time to read because, a) there was too much detail and b) because every time a song, video or concert was mentioned I felt obliged to go to YouTube to check if I agreed with the authors’ analysis. I must admit I discovered some amazing songs and videos I would never have seen otherwise but I spent a lot of time doing it and I wish, as with Dave Stewart’s memoir, that I had wanted to go exploring rather than thought I better do it to add some context to the descriptions.

I still think Annie Lennox is a fascinating and amazing artist and I hope she is living a good life. From recent videos she has shared online it seems she is.

[Francesco Alessio · Rating 3 out of 5]

Libro scritto molto bene. L'argomento è trattato in modo certamente esaustivo; anzi, attraverso di esso, si riesce a instaurare una totale empatia con la Lennox in tutto quello che ha vissuto, nel bene e nel male (per esempio, mi sono immedesimato nella cantante nei passaggi in cui si menzionavano i suoi problemi di gola). In più, è stato un piacere leggere le numerose citazioni di frasi del produttore Jack Steven, che oltre ad essere un genio è un mio amico. Unica pecca secondo me: in alcuni punti la precisione nei dettagli diventa un po' eccessiva e il capitolo un po' prolisso. Da non perdere, comunque, per gli amanti di Annie Lennox, Eurythmics, di Jack Steven e della musica.

[Sean Barnett · Rating 1 out of 5]

Worst book ever. I should have realised in the opening paragraph when Annie declined to speak with the authors. Just a mishmash of everyone else's take on the great lady. If I could have awarded zero stars, I would have done so