Blog Archives
3 Bloomsbury Books Shortlisted for the British Sports Book Awards
Bloomsbury are proud to announce that we have three books on the shortlist for the British Sport Book Awards. The three books to be shortlisted are:
Best Illustrated Book
Coppi by Herbie Sykes
Best New Writer
Sit Down and Cheer by Martin Kelner
Best Cricket Book
We’ll Get ’Em in Sequins by Max Davidson
The winner for each category will be announced on Tuesday 21st May 2013 – fingers crossed!
Smashing Cycling Bash – Rouleur style
The wine (and more crucially, beer) is chilled, the books are artfully arranged, and the doorman is in position. It must be time for another super-glamorous Bloomsbury launch party.
Having persuaded Rouleur to allow us to publish their supremely gorgeous cycling books, this Wednesday we opened our doors to the great and the good of the cycling fraternity to celebrate our new Rouleur Books imprint and the first offspring, Coppi and Le Metier.
Rouleur’s Bruce Sandell and Guy Andrews with Bloomsbury Head of Sport Charlotte Croft – A class act
Slightly overwhelmed by the rabid RSVPing which followed the invites being sent out, we’d been forced to emergency-order more booze, so the signs were good, and we weren’t disappointed. A jolly crowd, many sporting an assortment of slightly troubling Movembers, mingled, caught up with old friends and suffered through the obligatory speeches.
Bloomsbury author Richard Moore and his agent enjoying the party
British cyclist and Team Manager of the newly-formed Madison Genesis team, Roger Hammond enjoys a bevvy with some cycling chums
Journo Rob Penn and Jasper Sutcliffe, Senior Buyer at Foyles, brought together through the love of all-things bike
As a Bloomsbury someone who shall remain nameless whispered to me half way through – ‘one of the best launch parties we’ve had’ – a resounding success full of strange but enjoyable conversations (sample facts unearthed: 1. Never fall asleep in a 
field in the Cotswolds on a cycling trip – you will wake to find red kites circling above, assuming you are dead 2. The roof of Number 50 was the perfect place to do a tab of acid in the 60s), which was only broken up by the rather flashback end-of-school-disco switching on and off of lights to encourage the last few stragglers to stick on their helmets, rev up their Bromptons, and weave their merry way home…
Musings by Charlotte Croft, Head of Team Sport at Bloomsbury
Coppi: Inside the Legend of Il Campionissimo
Fausto Coppi remains the most iconic cyclist in the history of the sport. For twenty years either side of the war his extravagant talent, combined with a unique charisma and human frailty, captivated fans across Europe. Moreover, he revolutionised the sport of bike racing itself, laying the foundations for the generations who would follow.
Coppi was Il Campionissimo; his greatness so unequivocal that his celebrity transcended mere sport. As such, both his professional and private lives were endlessly pawed over by his country’s insatiable post-war media. In deserting his wife and daughter for a divorcée in 1954, he traumatised Catholic Italy. Thereafter his life became a soap opera from which he was unable to escape until his dramatic death in 1960.
Herbie Sykes’s new book Coppi is a beautiful and unique depiction of this legendary cyclist, built around an extraordinary collection of hand-picked, rarely seen images and testimonies from those who knew him intimately. These images, some genuine masterpieces, were unearthed through hours of painstaking research. Allied to the personal truths of those closest to him, they reveal the man behind the Fausto Coppi myth.
This book strips away many of the half-truths and downright lies which have been grafted onto his legend over the decades, making it a very different kind of sports biography, and a must-have for all genuine cycling fans.
Nick in Nets
Kirsty
Naomi
Sarah
