Agent Palmer

I don’t read many self-help books, but the distinctive factor that makes the difference between the ones I read and all the rest is that the few I have read, all come across as conversations. They all feel like a friend giving you some advice… And Out of My Mind…and Intending to Stay There: A Battleplan for Life by Kurt Sussman is one such example…

It is an easy read because it is conversational, but don’t assume it’s also a quick read, as it will make you think… In fact, that’s the goal… Truth be told, the synopsis is pretty much one of the better and most accurate synopses I have read, especially for a self-help book.

You may or may not know David Mitchell from Peep Show, Would I Lie To You or one of his many other panel show appearances, or he may be someone you know absolutely nothing about, but neither knowing him nor not knowing him should deter you from reading his back story in his autobiography David Mitchell: Back Story: A Memoir.

What Mitchell has written is perhaps the most authentic and self-critical autobiography I have, and may ever, read. It’s refreshing in that way, because he’s not afraid to take the piss out of the industry he’s in or, most often, himself.

When people say, “I just don’t get into sport” it really doesn’t matter what sport you’re trying to get them into or to watch or experience. Often, there’s little you can do to get them to give it a chance. You may inevitably counter them with the point that sport, in almost any and every form is more than just the sum of its parts, and that’s the main reason that people enjoy watching it.

Most of the time, it’s the things that happen off the field, off the track, off the court, that build and bleed onto those places to enrich the drama of the athletic contest.