Bookshelf - Other authors

Complete review published in GP+ Issue 394 - March 2025

Formula 2, The glory years, 1967-84


After its metamorphoses into F3000 and GP2, the category is rightly back to being called by its once so familiar name. This mighty tome pays tribute to the era when it was officially entitled the European Formula 2 Championship.The year-by-year format makes for easy reading, and the basic introduction to each chapter is complemented by beautiful and insightfully-captioned photographs, some 900 of them mainly sourced from the huge collection of renowned Sixties snapper Jutta Fausel, whose own story is as interesting as many of the drivers’.
Complete review published inGP+ Issue 394 - March 2025

Faces of Formula 1 The Sixties

Hartmut Lehbrink/Jorg-Thomas Fodisch
Of course, the background stories of many of Müller’s subjects are well known, as are their oft-moody images. But what adds to the depth of this work are the stories of the middle men, such as Mike Spence, Lorenzo Bandini, Jean-Pierre Beltoise.... Better yet are those of so many destined to be remembered only by diehard enthusiasts.The imagery is the intended star. The photographs are deeply inspiring and impressive, somehow the more so because they are in monochrome which adds to the sense of history that is redolent throughout the work.
Complete review published in GP+ Issue 393 - Dec. 2024

How to read F1

Jennie Gow
How to Read F1 is a no-frills, no-nonsense book aimed specifically at new fans, with whom Jennie shares her long-held passion for the sport with enthusiasm and insight. The format is simple: in alphabetical order she examines popular topics or jargon and explains their definition or the story behind them, so you can get yourself right up to date. It’s not just a good read for newbies, but testament to some good old-fashioned human courage.
Complete review published inGP+ Issue 393 - Dec. 2024

How did I get here?

Peyer Wright
Peter’s story is gripping; he has been writing since the Nineties, and he does it with wit. When the story reaches the relevant stages, he has the ability to explain ground effect, porpoising and the like in a manner that even laymen can start to understand.The stories are packed with familiar characters and associated anecdotes, rendering the foregoing so interesting as he also revealed how the various interactions influenced many of his career decisions.This is a superbly produced book, which gives us great insight to a man who had huge influence on F1 design and direction, and played a key role in safety enhancement.
Complete review published in GP+ Issue 382 - July 2024

Texas legend Jim Hall and his Chaparrals

George Levy
Levy, a former editor of Autoweek, has done a superb job. Hall himself expresses admiration for the depth of his research, and it is evident on every page as the story unravels at breakneck speed and character after character from Hall’s past steps forward to add their voices to the narrative. With photography from a raft of greats, this is a beautiful official biography that grips the reader with the tenacious downforce of a 2J and never lets go.
Complete review published inGP+ Issue 383 - August 2024

Both sides of the barrier

Stuart Dent
The book’s title refers to the two stages of Dent’s life. This tome covers the first stage, usually outside the barrier. It is a genuine, frill-free, diehard fan’s odyssey, and Dent makes no pretence of it being anything else.He oozes passion and a deep knowledge of the sport’s history and heritage and has a fund of great stories of his adventures attending races as a punter in his early days. If you love the sport, you’ll thoroughly enjoy the way the A-Side rips along as it takes you to the end of that decade. If the B-Side is only half as good as this, it too will be a great book.
Complete review published in GP+ Issue 381 - July 2024

Wild about racing

Derek Wild
Wild has a comfortable style in his writing as he shares many tales about one of the sport’s greatest eras. Besides his early years, he is generous with some very funny stories about the things mechanics used to get up to. All this is interspersed with tales from all the myriad circuits Team Lotus visited, in the USA, Mexico, South Africa, Argentina and Europe. This genre of books will be meat and drink to true enthusiasts raised on the derring-do of the Clarks, Hills, Surteeses, Gurneys and Stewarts of the game.
Complete review published inGP+ Issue 381 - July 2024

Formula 1 Car by car 2000-09

Peter Higham
Regular GP+ readers know that this is one of our favourite series, beautifully researched and written. The format is simple, and the fact that each volume follows the same basic layout is one of its strengths as it enables you to compare and contrast the various decades and develop your sense of the manner in which the sport changes so frequently.The smaller teams get the same neat and concise assessment as their more successful brethren, ensuring not just fairmindedness but that each volume stands as such a valuable historic source of what went on.
Complete review published in GP+ Issue 372 - April 2024

Starting from the back of the grid

Kris Henley
Immerse yourself in one man’s hilarious and searingly honest story of F1 adventure. It is very funny, even Guenther Steiner’s foreword. He may have started from the back of the grid, but in the F1 amusement stakes, Kris Henley pulls the trick off with great style and is sitting on pole position right now.
Complete review published inGP+ Issue 371 - March 2024

Happy lucky days

Bob Evans
Bob tells his engaging life story very well. All that’s missing, perhaps, is a wee bit more about his personal life, especially after racing.He writes like he drove, with confidence, courage, great style and a lot of pinpoint accuracy. And he pulls no punches. Indeed, throughout Bob is always candid, and often very funny, when introducing us to all the colourful people he encountered.This book is thoroughly recommended, has many excellent illustrations, and is a publication to grace any true enthusiast’s shelves.
Complete review published in GP+ Issue 367 - Dec. 2023

Jim Crawford Lessons in courage

Kevin Guthrie
If you already have a copy of ‘Jim Crawford, The life of a modest racing hero’, Kevin Guthrie’s previous tome, don’t confuse it with this book. Guthrie did a grand job first time around of telling the story of an engaging character through copious interviews with people who knew him well. ‘Lessons in Courage’, is even better, an altogether grander volume with loads more photographs, significantly more text and an even deeper insight into what made a fundamentally modest and seriously under-rated guy such a great racer, a man whose talents were worthy of much better fortune.
Complete review published inGP+ Issue 371 - March 2024

The Likely Lads

Chris Ellard
The Likely Lads remembers the drivers and personalities who inhabited the fast-paced world of Formula 3 motor racing in the heady days of the swinging sixties. It’s one of those books you can happily dip in and out of, though not all of the tales therein are in themselves happy. It is packed with anecdotes, nicely put together and well illustrated with evocative images.Ellard’s passionate and painstaking research adds so much through the 75 gathering of contemporary published reports and stories, or recollections sourced from those still extant.
Complete review published in GP+ Issue 367 - Dec. 2023

Benetton Rebels of Formula 1

Damien Smith
Unconventional, flamboyant, groundbreaking, colourful, controversial - Benetton was all of those things. And they make for a great, if controversial, story, well told, even if you are left with a feeling that somehow the full truth of 1994 still remains out, tantalisingly obscured. This is a welcome and long overdue account of how a rebel team cocked several snooks at the Establishment and left its indelible mark on F1.
Complete review published inGP+ Issue 367 - Dec. 2023

24 Hours Le Mans 100 years of legends

Denis Bernard, Basil Davoine, Julien Holtz and Gerard Holtz
It’s beautifully produced, and tells the story in a quirky but immensely fun way. It’s not your straightforward chronological record, but instead a series of great little vignettes which intersperse recurring descriptions of the various manufacturers who raced there and the best drivers.If you love Le Mans, you will adore this book into which you can delve happily for hours on end assimilating thousands of facts of which you might have been completely unaware.
Complete review published in GP+ Issue 355 - July 2023

Super bears

James Page
Hesketh Racing left a valid mark in the annals of F1 history. How many teams of late have won races in their first or even second seasons as a constructor? This wonderful, engrossing and highly revealing and informative book fulfills a vital role in recording an important slice of British motor racing history, while telling a wonderful racing fairy tale. It’s supported throughout by brilliant professional colour and monochrome photography, plus personal snapshots taken by those who were there, and myriad memorabilia imagery.
Complete review published inGP+ Issue 357 - August 2023

Roger Williamson

Kevin Guthrie & Darren Banks
One way to ensure that departed racers never get forgotten and can be introduced to new generations is this sort of book, in which family members, friends and fans offer their memories. Altogether, 52 people have contributed to this publication full of imagery as it is of wonderful recollections of people who rated Roger, a happy-go-lucky young man, world champion material, who died at the age of 25.
Complete review published in GP+ Issue 346 - April 2023

Gerry Birrell

Darren Banks
Darren Banks’ latest book tells the sad story of a young Scot, determined to follow in the wheeltracks of Innes Ireland, Jim Clark and Jackie Stewart, who perished in an accident during practice for the 1973 F2 race at Rouen when a deflated tyre put him into the Armco barriers on the frighteningly fast 150 mph fifthgear swerves on the way down to the Nouveau Monde hairpin. Banks has done a tremendous job in capturing his tale, and this nicely produced book stands as an enduring tribute to a man who deserved so much more than Fate saw fit to grant him.
Complete review published inGP+ Issue 353 - June 2023

Tyrrell

Richard Jenkins
What really makes this book stand out is the focus on telling much of a well-known tale through the eyes and words of surviving team members.Jenkins has done a tremendous job, researching myriad situations in great depth, and sourcing so many people whose views grace his text. Uncle Ken’s team was part of the sport’s fabric, and this fine tribute to those personnel and their collective endeavour is another of those must read volumes for any self-respecting enthusiast’s library.
Complete review published in GP+ Issue 345 - March 2023

Formula 1 Technology

Steve Rendle
Rendle sets out the stall with an insightful overview of the evolution of F1 technology, starting at the inauguration of the FIA Formula 1 World Championship bringing it up to date with the reintroduction of ground effect.He writes with a clever blend of technical savviness allied to an ability to explain to make it digestible. It will thus appeal not just to those who feel all at sea with the jargon, but also to the techno-geeks.He leads us through the world of the smartest design engineers and does it with superb full-colour photographic illustration. And the peerless artworks of Giorgio Piola.
Complete review published inGP+ Issue 348 - May 2023

Surviving to drive

Guenther Steiner
Be warned! If you are planning to read the book in a library, you will be laughing out loud whether you intended to or not. But… beneath all that humour, there is a very serious morality tale here. It’s much more than a flippant book packed with cursing. When he has something tough to say, Guenther pulls no punches. He also offers insight into various aspects, such as diversity and the budget cap.If you want a brutally honest, yet colourful assessment of life in F1, this is definitely for you.
Complete review published in GP+ Issue 343 - Feb. 2023

Ferrari 1960-1965 The hallowed years

William Huon
Huon’s format works extremely well: in each year he begins with an apposite introduction which sets the scene, then deals with each race individually. Diehard historians will appreciate the chassis numbers he includes in the results. In his youth, he met many of the drivers while spectating at circuits and the value of such priceless knowledge underpins his insightful narrative. The engrossing text is perfectly complemented by the contemporary work of Bernard Cahier, one of F1’s greatest photo-journalists.
Complete review published inGP+ Issue 343 - Feb. 2023

Life on the Wilds side!

Mike Wilds
Those who were young when Mike Wilds raced in the mid-seventies and have retained their passion for motor racing will love this book for myriad reasons. Mike takes us on an enjoyable journey from his humble beginning, and reveals how he parlayed a job washing cars for The Chequered Flag into his first races. It’s one of those stories you immediately buy into, a tale of a young guy with passion and ambition and how, back then, that was almost enough to get you on the road to success. And those who didn’t see that era, read this excellent book, beautifully illustrated and with stunning Andrew Kitson illustrations.
Complete review published in GP+ Issue 341 - Oct. 2022

Driven to crime

Crispian Besley
The book is a panoply of the temptations that face the good and bad of motor sport, a testament to the weakness of human nature, and an absolutely fascinating read.You will want to put it down (because of its heft), but you won’t do that for long because something will tempt you back to read just one more chapter. Then another. And another.
Complete review published inGP+ Issue 342 - Dec. 2022

Jacky Ickx

Jon Saltinstall
This is a very special book which covers all Jacky Ickx’s races, 573 of them, from F1, CanAm, world sportscars, motorcycles and other genres, many of them with a victorious outcome. This exhaustively researched book has been written with his full cooperation, with more than 900 images, most of them absolutely captivating. Not bad for a man who used to say he had done nothing worth recording…
Complete review published in GP+ Issue 225 - Nov. 2017

How to build a car

Adrian Newey
Formula 1’s foremost designer, Adrian Newey is arguably one of Britain’s greatest engineers and this is his fascinating and powerful memoir. How to Build a Car explores the story of Adrian's unrivalled 35-year career in Formula 1 through the cars he has designed, the drivers he has worked with and the races in which he's been involved.
Complete review published inGP+ Issue 338 - Oct. 2022

Formula 1 circuits

Maurice Hamilton
Formula 1 Circuits covers every track which has staged a World Championship Grand Prix since the series started in May 1950.It also include a circuit locator map.This is a finely produced book into which one can dip and dive at one’s pleasure, and is one of those that will get great use and give great enjoyment over the years.
Complete review published in GP+ Issue 311 - Oct. 2021

Colin Chapman

Karl Ludvigsen
Chapman’s was a mixed legacy as one of the greatest creative forces in the world of the automobile. Was he an unparalleled innovator or an uninhibited exploiter of the uncredited ideas of others? An in-depth, hard and questioning look at the man who was arguably the greatest technical director in F1 history.

A different kind of life

Virginia Williams
Ginny Williams wrote the story of her life with her husband Frank as he battled to build a great F1 team. It is brutally honest and very revealing.A remarkable book, considered by some to be one of the best in the history of the sport.

Watching the wheels

Damon Hill
In 1996, Damon Hill was crowned Formula One World Champion.For the first time ever he tells the story of his journey through the last golden era of the sport when he took on the greats including Ayrton Senna and Michael Schumacher and emerged victorious in 1996, stepping out of the shadow of his legendary father Graham Hill.

To hell and back

Niki Lauda
Niki crossed the line between life and death and fought back to even greater glory. Even people who know nothing of F1 have heard of his crash when he was dragged from the inferno of his Ferrari so badly injured he was given the last rites. Within 33 days, he was racing again at Monza.A year later, he reclaimed his World Championship title.
Complete review published in GP+ Issue 277 - July 2020

Shadow

Pete Lyons
Shadow was the only US-based team to win a Can-Am championship, and one of only three to score a victory in F1. But Don Nichols has long remained a shadowy figure. Pete Lyons lifts the veil from this secretive man and the innovative racing cars and the world-class team he created. This is one of the most outstanding books of 2020, and one of Lyons’s all-time best.

The first 1000

Roger Smith
A must-have bible for F1 addicts!720 pages covering every Championship Grand Prix race from the first one in 1950, to the 1000th in 2019 with results, facts, race ratings, graphs, photos and folklore.
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