Me: Elton John Official Autobiography Hardcover – October 15, 2019

I have not read an autobiography in ages... I'm a big Elton John fan so I decided to read this...it was very eye opening on how life was for a musician especially in the 60/70s. This was a really good book & I would recommend it ...so happy his life turned around..everyone deserves love & happiness.

If Elton John means anything to you, this book is a must read. He eloquently shares the ups and downs of an extraordinary career, while often seeing the bright side of what could have been career ending situations. Loved this memoir!

I could hardly put the book down. It read like a novel even though it was an autobiography. Elton didn’t seem to leave anything out and was so honest about his whole life. His sense of humor kept me chuckling and even laughing out loud at some of his experiences. I loved the book.

I have been a fan of Elton John for a lifetime. Tells a great story... Warts and all. Lots of great background.

I was a little young when Elton John was in his prime. He was more of my sister’s generation. I really didn’t care about his music until I saw him in concert in the early 80’s. Wow, could he entertain. My sister loaned this book to me and I am so glad I read it. Elton is so honest and open about his whole life in this book. It makes him real instead of some outrageous entertainer. If you are a fan, you must read this. If you aren’t a fan, you probably should read it. It will probably make you respect him more.

This book was an enjoyable read. He doesn't hold anything back. He seems like a man who knows who he is, what he is and what he's been through to get to where he is today. He tells it all both the good and the bad. If you want to read a book about Elton John this is the one to read.

I hoped for a little more than name dropping and rockstar drug addictions. However, if you start then you must slog through to the end, which is fairly uplifting. Elton's tale of surviving as a gay man was not what I expected. While I admired his early music, he had lost my attention about the time he descended into the trap of addiction. It's good to know he eventually recovered from that, but I was still a bit disappointed by the whole story. We are of an age, with myself just two years younger than he. Some of our experiences are shared, of course, but I'm happy to have escaped most of what he tells.

I have read a few reviews here which, as always, indicate these folks have not actually READ this book, but instead read a clickbait headline, then an article, which takes things from the book out of context and splashes them on a 45-seconds-to-read article.It actually reminds me of some of the sections in this book that mention tabloids and how harmful they can be. Kind of interesting.I am writing this review a few moments after I have finished the book. And it was great!There is so much to admire about this book, not least of which is John's ability to be honest about his life, about his past and about how much he hurt other people.It's startling to read his realizations about how many times he was so horrible to people, and how candid he is about the life of a sequestered star, how he himself lost complete touch with reality by surrounding himself with sycophants. YES...He does talk about Michael Jackson and Elvis Presley, and others. But it isn't anything that would surprise you had you any inkling of the kind of life they'd lived for years before they died. He also relates to them. If anything, he completely DE-glamourizes fame, and shines a very harsh light on it. People who claim that he is too hard on this or that person and isn't very "nice" about someone because he "dishes" on them is also absurd. What he says about anyone else whom he has encountered in his decades of public life is no more harsh (in fact, less so) than the things he says about himself and his many many transgressions, which he is all-too-willing to name in the interest of complete transparency.It is when he realized finally that he didn't want to die, and he sought help for his addictions and eating disorder that things began to crystallize. And he wanted to help other people. Ryan White's death had a profound impact on the way in which he lived, what a waste it was and what he was throwing away when he had the ability to give so much, and be so much more as a human being instead of Rock Icon Sir Elton John. And that by giving to others of himself in a way he hadn't before, he was healing, too.If you go into this book looking for inconsistencies in the dates or history or any of it, you will probably find it because you want to do so. An autobiography, however, belongs to that person. I am 47, and I cannot imagine remembering with complete accuracy what date and what year I met certain people in my life. And I don't know many people or go that many places. This is Elton John's story about himself. I found, in reading it, that he didn't have anything to hide, and wasn't pulling any punches. He is who he is.If you read the book in its entirety without any preconceived notions, like I did, you will likely not be disappointed, but feel like you've read the story of an incredibly gifted and talented person who has, like many people, had to struggle with and recover from a very difficult childhood, and attempt to live as a "normal" person who doesn't need drugs and drink to cope with life. He, as Judy Garland once said, "want{s} the same thing that other people want.... Just seem{s} to have a harder time getting it."I found this book to be about forgiveness, too, in a world where no one is likely to forgive anyone, least of all themselves. In each of our lives, I'm pretty sure we could use some forgiveness, both giving it and getting it.

For someone my age, Elton John became a star way before my time – though I grew up and he was still a big star, it was quite some time after his appearance onto the scene. I knew about him, in terms of him being a huge rock star but nothing about him as a person or his stories.Since reading this I have become more of a fan of him, it is a brilliant read and is so funny and brutally honest at times. He speaks about so many different aspects of his life, and in particular some great stories of him and Rod Stewart trying to upset each other even though they are friends, that was a cracking read.This book covers it all from his years in rehabilitation to when he had prostate cancer, his childhood, his parents’ rushed wartime marriage and much more, everything is laid out bare here for all to see.This is a fantastic read and is very moving at times as well as being hilarious at times, I thoroughly recommend this even if you aren’t a fan of his music.Please take a second to hit the helpful button, as it really helps and makes reviewing worthwhile!

I have no idea if Elton sat down and wrote this book himself. Or if he did, how much it was edited. But I'm a former professional writer, part time musician and therapist, and about the same age as Elton, my overall take was that I found nothing inauthentic or incongruent in it.The style is very straightforward, it's not a timeline diary piece, but it's almost in diary style. The first chapter actually had me in tears, because Elton's experiences so closely match mine as a child of the 1950s. His social background, the culture into which he was born, his parents' hasty wartime marriage and subsequent unhappiness, I had a depressed angry father too, and my mother was a narcissist, and I am a working class grammar school girl. I even won the same music scholarship as Elton, although I attended the Guildhall. I'm glad I never had a record deal and a big musical career looking back, but Elton's story is a strong and valid warning to anyone young now believing that becoming a global recording artist is a dream. It's usually a nightmare, and Elton's survival, while heartening and impressive, is not always going to be possible for others seduced by celebrity and riches.Pop is more competitive and disposable than ever now. Elton had the kind of artistic freedom today's chart fodder can only dream of. Any autobiography is going to fight accusations of hagiography and false mea culpa moments, just enough confessional to spice up the book, not so much the reader is put off. I've never been a 'superfan' of anyone, my tastes are just too wide, so apart from his early catalogue which for someone like me, a contemporary could hardly avoid, and which I did love by and large, my experience of the rest of his considerable body of work is limited. It's a shame he does not believe he has been able to produce and market material as good as his earlier work, there are gems from later years, for example Sixty Years On and Indian sunset are also masterpieces to me but you'll not hear them much on Radio 2.Elton's puzzlement about the origins of his short temper, his neediness and 'attachment issues' and his addiction are less of a mystery to me than him, although I would not presume to guess at the detail. That he happily owns them all through the book is certainly further than some celebrity 'tell all's and slightly less than a few. Overall pretty enlightening and in places even uplifting, it sits somewhere in the middle of two recent celebrity reads I've worked through, Sean Penn's textually and intellectually dense bid for literary status which was just too surreal to bother with in the end, and the biogs, like Whitesnake's which quickly descends into a discography and tour diary. People read bio's and autobios expecting some stripping back of the image and I was not disappointed with Elton's.He's been painted as an indulgent, drug addled hysteric too long by the gutter press, I hope this book goes a long way to redress that.

Elton John was a bit before my time he came to fame the year I was born so although I was aware of him, I was not that aware of his story. This book is remarkable, completely without vanity and funny and so honest. I loved the bitchy tales of him and Rod Stewart trying to upset each other even though they are buddies really funny. The rehab years, prostrate cancer everything is laid bare. A really really brilliant autobiography I literally could not put it down and will no doubt read it again.

I couldn’t wait to get my hands on this book and was not disappointed. As I was reading it I could almost hear Elton speaking the words. Very well written and gives a brutally honest account of his life which moulded him into the beautifully talented man that he is. His love for music shines through from start to finish highlighting the ups and downs of his life with bare all accounts of his addictions and troubled relationships with his mother and father. Elton has worked hard and has been through a lot. It warms my heart to know that he is now settled with his husband and two sons. Thank you Elton John! ❤️

I have to be honest, I probably wouldn't have read this book if I hadn't heard him talking about it on the radio. I'm not really a fan of celeb autobiographies and not a major fan of Sir Elton's. But I have to say from the first page I couldn't put it down.The brutal honesty with which he talks about his extraordinary life, without ever trying to make excuses for his behaviour was refreshing and at times moving, funny and fascinating.Highly recommend!