Product Description

For the first time ever, Bono--the biggest rock star in the world--tells his life story.

Bono's career is unlike any other in rock history. As the lead singer of U2, Bono has sold 130 million albums, won fourteen Grammys, and played numerous sold-out world tours, but he has also lobbied and worked with world leaders from Bill Clinton and George W. Bush to Nelson Mandela on debt relief, AIDS, and other critical global issues. He has collaborated with the same musicians for nearly three decades and has been married to his childhood sweetheart since 1982. His life, at all turns, resists the rock star clichés.

In a series of intimate conversations with his friend Michka Assayas, a music journalist who has been with the band since the very beginning, Bono reflects on his transformation from the extrovert singer of a small Irish post-punk band into one of the most famous individuals in the world; and from an international celebrity to an influential spokesperson for the Third World. He speaks candidly about his faith, family, commitment, influences, service, and passion. Bono: A Self-Portrait in Conversation is the closest we will come, for now, to a memoir from the iconic frontman of U2.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #218434 in Books
• Published on: 2005-04-21
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 336 pages

From Publishers Weekly
U2 vocalist, celebrity activist and one of the world's most outsized rock stars, Bono symbolically takes off his habitual shades to reveal the relatively normal guy behind the flashy (and occasionally bombastic) public persona in this series of wide-ranging conversations. Readers familiar with the Irish singer won't be surprised that he comes off as both earnest and quick minded, but the book's long-form q&a format also reveals an acerbic sense of humor and genuine humility. Topics shift and flow in a fairly nonlinear fashion; anecdotes jump around from 1979 to 1998, from Dublin to Africa, from music to father-son relationships. Presuming that most readers are intimate with U2's history and discography, interviewer Assayas gives little background information other than the dates and location of each discussion. The lack of context or clear chronology is at times frustrating, but Assayas, a French journalist and longtime friend of the group, compensates by steering the conversations into difficult territory: politics, religion and the personal dynamics of a successful rock band. This is sure to appeal to completists; more casual fans may snap it up after seeing one of U2's forthcoming concerts for their album How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb. Agent, Ed Victor. (Apr. 21)
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Review
...this book will be appreciated by U2 devotees. And even non-fans will find inspiration in Bono's passion for living. -- People, April 25, 2005

About the Author
Michka Assayas is a music journalist and novelist who lives and works in Paris. He met Bono in London in 1980, and was the first journalist to champion U2 outside Ireland and the United Kingdom. Michka and Bono have spent the last two years putting this book together at Bono's home in Dublin, and in Paris, Bologna, and on the French Riviera.

Customer Reviews

A fascinating look into Bono's character
A long-time fan of U2's music and impressed by Bono's activisim, I was anxious to read this new book. And I loved it! I couldn't put it down!

Written in a coversational style, I at first thought it may be difficult to follow. Instead, I pleasantly realized that it made me feel as if I was listening to Bono talk to a group of which I was part. Because we are actually reading his words, I think we really get a look into Bono's mind - or even his soul.

Every topic I could want to hear Bono talk about is covered - his music, the band, his family, his belief in God, and his activism. It had it all.

I highly recommend this book to anyone wanting to learn more about what makes Bono tick. It confirmed to me that he has a very big heart, a great intellect, and incredible talent.

Enjoy!

Honesty
Before I read this book I loved U2's music but considered Bono, although very hot, to be yet another uneducated pompous ass celebrity with a god complex. After reading the book I realize I was the judgemental pompous ass. Bono is a man of conviction that gets mistaken as arrogance. He believes in something bigger than himself and stands up for it in spite of pompous ass people like me who doubt his sincerity simply because he's a celebrity. Sorry Bono, keep up the good work.

Conversations Between Friends
If you wanted to ask Bono a question, what would it be?

Would it be about the music?

Would it be about his personal life? Perhaps the deaths of his parents?

Would you ask about the formation of the most successful band in history?

Perhaps you'd want to know more about his work in support of AIDS and hunger releif.

All of these questions, and many, many more are asked and answered in this book. In fact, almost the whole book is a series of questions that ramble from subject to subject with no pattern. These questions and answers are like a normal conversation flows between friends.

Because they are friends, a true respect exists between the two men and it comes out in the book. This means that there is great insight shown into how Bono thinks. And it comes out that he thinks very well indeed.

This is a fascinating book, not just because of the fascination with the singer, but because of the insight he brings to us about places like Africa and the Soviet Union.