The Moon's a Balloon: The Guardian’s Number One Hollywood Autobiography (Coronet Books)

by David Niven

ONE OF THE BESTSELLING MEMOIRS OF ALL TIME WITH OVER FIVE MILLION COPIES SOLD WORLDWIDE

Discover the heartfelt, laugh-out-loud account of one of Hollywood's greatest actors and, above all, greatest men

Debonair English wit and humourist extraordinaire, star of The Pink Panther, Casino Royal and Around the World in 80 Days, few Hollywood actors are remembered as fondly as David Niven.

In this bestselling autobiography, Niven shows how, even as an unknown young man, he knew how to live the good life, regaling us with tales of school expulsion and wartime hi-jinks. However, it is his accounts of working and partying with the legends of the silver screen - from Lawrence Oliver and Vivien Leigh to Elizabeth Taylor, Noel Coward and dozens of others - that turn this memoir into an outright masterpiece.

An intimate, gossipy, warm and above all charming account of life inside Hollywood's dream factory, The Moon is a Balloon is a classic to be read and enjoyed time and again.

***

'An immensely enjoyable, witty and racy memoir' Sunday Times

'Forthright, bawdy, and often hilarious, zany and zestful, his anecdotes should keep you entertained for hours' Sunday Express

'Niven's life was Wodehouse with tears' John Mortimer

• ISBN10: 0140239243
• ISBN13: 9780140239249
• Publish Date: 27 October 1994 (first published 11 October 1971)
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: GB
• Imprint: Penguin Books Ltd
• Format: Paperback (B-Format (198x129 mm))
• Pages: 336
• Language: English

Reviews

[brokentune]

Charming. Absolutely charming.

This isn't the greatest of memoirs I have read but Niven's rather down to earth narration makes it worthwhile. For someone so well known, he could have been much more arrogant but it is one of the aspects that makes this book so readable that he does not mind telling of his failures.

And, yet, I would have hoped for more insights and opinions rather than a more or less straight run-down of his life and career.