Stephanie Jane reviewed Confessions of a Conjuror by Derren Brown
An interesting autobiography
4 stars
An interesting take on the standard celeb autobiography in which Derren uses a detailed description of a card trick performed some years ago as the narrative thread, and drifting off at tangents as he is reminded of incidents from his early life, prompted to create random lists, chooses to name-drop (just a little!) and espouses his philosophies on life and its general lack of kindnesses.
The sense with which I came away from this book was that Derren didn't seem to like himself at all until comparatively recently. His almost overwhelming self-criticism is evident from the first minutes of the recording and there is very little of the dark, sexy persona created for his earlier TV shows. Several of the childhood memories do not show him in a good light at all and I will admit to cruelly sniggering at his embarrassment re Hugh Grant. Sorry, Derren!
This is a …
An interesting take on the standard celeb autobiography in which Derren uses a detailed description of a card trick performed some years ago as the narrative thread, and drifting off at tangents as he is reminded of incidents from his early life, prompted to create random lists, chooses to name-drop (just a little!) and espouses his philosophies on life and its general lack of kindnesses.
The sense with which I came away from this book was that Derren didn't seem to like himself at all until comparatively recently. His almost overwhelming self-criticism is evident from the first minutes of the recording and there is very little of the dark, sexy persona created for his earlier TV shows. Several of the childhood memories do not show him in a good light at all and I will admit to cruelly sniggering at his embarrassment re Hugh Grant. Sorry, Derren!
This is a revealing autobiography but it is not laid out easily so some work is required from the listener. I thought it was the more rewarding for this.
