Surrender
40 Songs, One Story
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- $18.99
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- $18.99
Publisher Description
NATIONAL BESTSELLER
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
"I was born with an eccentric heart."
A remarkable book by a combative artist, who finds he's at his best when he learns how to surrender.
Episodic and irreverent, introspective and illuminating, Surrender is Bono's life story, organized—but not too tidily—around forty U2 songs.
Bono grew up on the Northside of Dublin with a Catholic father and a Protestant mother during a time of rising sectarian violence in Ireland. The loss of his mother at the age of fourteen was the absence that would shape his search for family. He started out life feeling average, but ultimately his whole life would be pitted against the assumption that anyone is average.
His creativity is chaotic but ever present . . . in the studio, onstage, at the protest, along the halls of Congress, or in a corner bar. We read about his anger issues, which colour his writing on love and nonviolence, and hear him own up to an ego "far taller than my self-esteem."
Across four decades, U2 transform from teenage wannabes to the biggest band in the world, and Bono evolves from a part-time activist to a full-time force in the fight to cancel poor countries' debt and persuade governments, particularly the United States, to respond to the global AIDS emergency. We are with him at the birth of PEPFAR, the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief. At the time, it amounted to the biggest health intervention in the history of medicine to fight a single disease. He describes the campaigners of ONE, the NGO he cofounded, as "factivists" and sister organization (RED) as a "gateway drug" to activism.
U2 fans will learn why Bono believes U2 have stayed together despite decades of personal struggle and fiery creative disagreements and find keys to unlock the meaning of the band's most popular and influential songs.
The doors are opened to Bono's interior life. The squandering of human potential is a constant theme, as is his faith, which he describes as sorting the signal from the noise, a "still small voice" he hears strongest in his marriage, his music, and in the fight against extreme poverty.
Above all, Surrender is a love story written to his wife, Ali, whom he asked out on a first date the same week as the band's first rehearsal. Alison Stewart supplies direction for every major scene in this drama, including the third act they now enter, with more questions than answers regarding what to fight for and when to surrender.
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
Get ready to see the world through the eyes of one of its biggest rock stars. Bono’s memoir leads us through the highs and lows of his life in and outside of his iconic band U2—and he tells his story with all the passion and poetry we’d expect from such an accomplished songwriter. We get intimate snapshots of his early years, including memories of playing the pharaoh in a school production of Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat with an Elvis-like swagger, living through the Troubles in Ireland, and the untimely death of his mother. There’s insight into the rarefied rock star life too, like when he got a tour of Liverpool from Sir Paul McCartney himself. We found the glimpses into the band’s creative process and conflicts absolutely fascinating. Much like his music, Bono’s memoir wraps you up and leaves you wanting more.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Bono, lead vocalist and primary lyricist for the rock band U2, reflects on his creative and personal evolution in this powerful and candid debut memoir. Born Paul David Hewson and raised in 1970s Dublin by a Catholic father and a Protestant mother, Bono always viewed music as his "prayers." With remarkable frankness, he details what makes a great song ("The greatest songwriting is never conclusive, but the search for conclusion"); domestic life with his wife, Ali, and their four children; how the band almost fell apart during the 1990 recording of Achtung Baby ("We ran out of love for being in the band"); why he always wears glasses (migraines that were eventually diagnosed as glaucoma); and his experience of the conflict between unionists and nationalists in Northern Ireland that lasted from 1968 to 1998. Along the way, Bono also shares plenty of memories of famous friends—Prince, he notes, is a "genius" who made him realize the importance of U2 owning their master tapes. Self-aware (Bono admits that sometimes he feels like he's "a sham of a rock star") and poignantly reflective ("I'm discovering surrender doesn't always have to follow defeat"), this is a must-read.
Customer Reviews
I thought this was a sincere read by a sincere individual. Thanks Bono!
I thought this was a sincere read by a sincere individual. Thanks Bono!