Romany and Tom

Author(s): Ben Watt

Biographies & Memoirs

Tommy Watt was a working-class Glaswegian jazz musician whose 1950s heyday took him into the glittering heart of London's West End. Romany Bain was a RADA-trained Shakespearian actress, who had triplets in her first marriage before becoming a leading showbiz feature writer. Divorcees from very different backgrounds, they came together like colliding trains in 1957. Both a personal journey and a portrait of his parents, Romany and Tom is a vivid story of the post-war years, ambition and stardom, family roots and secrets, life in clubs and in care homes. It is also about who we are, where we come from, and how we love and live with each other for a long time.

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An extraordinary achievement. A moving, funny and beautifully written memoir by musician, DJ and writer Ben Watt which carefully chronicles his parents' lives, their marriage and their decline into old age

Praise for Patient Ben Watt's harrowing, candid account ... lives on in the mind. A fine testimonial to his fortitude and his powers as a writer' William Boyd, Sunday Times Book of the Year Watt is made of particularly fine stuff, possessed of a shining intelligence The Times Astonishingly assured ... by turns terrifying, mordantly funny and intensely moving Mick Brown, Daily Telegraph He writes with a songwriter's eye for the telling phrase Robert McCrum, Observer Watt is such a responsible, deft writer that you feel straightaway you're in good hands. He doesn't want your sympathy - he wants to tell you something about the world William Leith, Mail on Sunday Quiet elegance and ringing epiphanic lyricism. Watt's writing shares these qualities and his book is a nearly flawless telling New Yorker

Born in 1962, Ben Watt is a musician, songwriter, DJ and author. His first book, Patient: The True Story of a Rare Illness was a New York Times Notable Book of the Year, voted a Sunday Times Book of the Year by William Boyd and shortlisted for the Esquire Non-fiction Book of the Year. He is perhaps most well known for his twenty-year career in alt-pop duo Everything But The Girl (1982-2002). He is also an international club and radio DJ, and since 2003 has run his own independent record labels Buzzin' Fly and Strange Feeling. Having recently returned to songwriting and live performance, his first solo album for thirty years is expected in 2014. He lives in north London with his wife Tracey Thorn and their three children. Follow him on Twitter: @Ben_Watt www.benwatt.com

General Fields

  • : 9781408853191
  • : Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
  • : Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
  • : January 2014
  • : 216mm X 135mm
  • : United Kingdom
  • : March 2014
  • : books

Special Fields

  • : Ben Watt
  • : Paperback
  • : Paperback
  • : Mar-14
  • : Mar-14
  • : 941.0850922
  • : 941.0850922
  • : 368
  • : 368