I was thinking about this after talking to Doug the other night about the books we've collected over the years... As a rabid fan of car racing, I've done my best to read just about anything I could find on racing, and racing drivers. I thought it might be fun to hear what people have read and enjoyed. I'll start with:
1] Just about anything Bill Tuckey has written. Loved his "Great Race" books from 1981 to 1988, "The Unforgiving Minute" (naturally) and "The Rise and Fall of Peter Brock", which gave some great background on both Brock and John Harvey.
2] "Motor Racing - the Australian Way" by various contributors, including luminaries such as Geoghegan, Moffat, Matich, Jane, Tuckey, Phil Irving and many more (it was published in 1971, my old school libray had a moth-eaten copy of it 20 years ago, and I've love to get my paws on a copy now!)
3] "To Hell and Back" - Niki Lauda's autobiography, which was a matter-of-fact narrative of his life to the end of 1985. A great insight into the F1 driver I admired above all
4] "Gilles Villeneuve" - Gerald Donaldon's bio on the bravest, and perhaps the craziest man to drive F1, ever. If you've ever seen the photo of Gilles at Monaco in 1980's Ferrari 312T5, with the car pointed at the camera as it crests the rise, the driver's helmet looking down the road, with armfulls of lock on, the car obviously travelling at near-as-dammit to 90 degrees to the direction it's pointing, you'd probably want to read the story of the little French-Canadian who immortalised #27, and cam to embody the archetypal Ferrari driver, even 22 years after his death.
Those are the stand-outs, although Ive also enjoyed Alan Jones' "Driving Ambition", "Bluebirds" - the autobio of Gina (daughter of Donald, grand-daughter of Sir Malcolm) Campbell, and bios on Prost, Mansell, Senna, Jim Richards, Brock Yates' Enzo Ferrari biography, Donaldson's James Hunt Bio, Skaife's "Diary of a Champion", Murray Walker's "Unless I'm much mistaken...", Sir Lawrence Hartnett's "Big Wheels, Little Wheels" (which gave a great history of How Holden came to be)... ahh I'll read just about anything!
How about you?
1] Just about anything Bill Tuckey has written. Loved his "Great Race" books from 1981 to 1988, "The Unforgiving Minute" (naturally) and "The Rise and Fall of Peter Brock", which gave some great background on both Brock and John Harvey.
2] "Motor Racing - the Australian Way" by various contributors, including luminaries such as Geoghegan, Moffat, Matich, Jane, Tuckey, Phil Irving and many more (it was published in 1971, my old school libray had a moth-eaten copy of it 20 years ago, and I've love to get my paws on a copy now!)
3] "To Hell and Back" - Niki Lauda's autobiography, which was a matter-of-fact narrative of his life to the end of 1985. A great insight into the F1 driver I admired above all
4] "Gilles Villeneuve" - Gerald Donaldon's bio on the bravest, and perhaps the craziest man to drive F1, ever. If you've ever seen the photo of Gilles at Monaco in 1980's Ferrari 312T5, with the car pointed at the camera as it crests the rise, the driver's helmet looking down the road, with armfulls of lock on, the car obviously travelling at near-as-dammit to 90 degrees to the direction it's pointing, you'd probably want to read the story of the little French-Canadian who immortalised #27, and cam to embody the archetypal Ferrari driver, even 22 years after his death.
Those are the stand-outs, although Ive also enjoyed Alan Jones' "Driving Ambition", "Bluebirds" - the autobio of Gina (daughter of Donald, grand-daughter of Sir Malcolm) Campbell, and bios on Prost, Mansell, Senna, Jim Richards, Brock Yates' Enzo Ferrari biography, Donaldson's James Hunt Bio, Skaife's "Diary of a Champion", Murray Walker's "Unless I'm much mistaken...", Sir Lawrence Hartnett's "Big Wheels, Little Wheels" (which gave a great history of How Holden came to be)... ahh I'll read just about anything!
How about you?