Bowie's Books

100 books explored in 100 short essays, each paired with a Bowie song and a beautiful illustration

A FINANCIAL TIMES PICK FOR 2019

A TIMES BOOK OF THE YEAR

'Brilliant. The unwritten Bowie book that needed writing' CAITLIN MORAN

'Splendid. Provides plenty of evidence of Bowie's restless, rummaging intelligence, and his pleasure in the fact that books allow readers to slip into someone else's skin and try it on for size' THE TIMES

'A witty and enlightening analysis of Bowie's 100 essential books . . . A handy, amusing, light-touch precis' OBSERVER

'What is your idea of perfect happiness?'
'Reading.'

'What is the quality you most like in a man?'
'The ability to return books.'

Three years before he died, David Bowie made a list of the one hundred books that had transformed his life – a list that formed something akin to an autobiography. From Madame Bovary to A Clockwork Orange, the Iliad to the Beano, these were the publications that had fuelled his creativity and shaped who he was.

In Bowie’s Books, John O’Connell explores this list in the form of one hundred short essays, each offering a perspective on the man, performer and creator that is Bowie, his work as an artist and the era that he lived in.

Brilliantly illustrated throughout and the perfect gift for Bowie fans and book lovers, Bowie's Books is much more than a list of books you should read in your lifetime: it is a unique insight into one of the greatest minds of our times, and an indispensable part of the legacy that Bowie left behind.