No Room for Secrets [Paperback]

Joanna Lumley (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 30, 2005

Patsy Stone in Absolutely Fabulous; Purdey in The New Avengers; Bond Girl in On Her Majesty's Secret Service; Sapphire in Sapphire and Steel; a castaway in Girl Friday; actress; model; writer; campaigner; inventor; TV presenter and journalist: Joanna Lumley has played many roles in her lifetime, but rarely had the opportunity to reveal her true self. Intimate, funny, intriguing and moving, No Room for Secrets is a more surprising and revealing autobiography than any sensational 'kiss and tell' memoir you will ever read. Inside you will find the real Joanna Lumley.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Joanna Lumley was born in India and grew up in England and the Far East. She started out modeling for Jean Muir and soon went on to become one of Britain's best-loved actresses. In 1995, Joanna was awarded with an OBE shortly after making the documentary film Girl Friday.

Product Details

• Paperback: 272 pages
• Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd (June 30, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0141015462
• ISBN-13: 978-0141015460
• Product Dimensions: 7.7 x 5 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #448,006 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Quirky, soulful autobiography, September 12, 2005

By 

T. Bently "tbently" (Berkshire, England) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: No Room for Secrets (Hardcover)

Joanna Lumley chooses not to go down the usual biographical route. Instead of charting the progress of her career she instead stages a kind of free-falling description of her life as she tours the rooms of her London house and allows particular objects or photographs to stir memories.

She has a particular gift for storytelling and in describing her childhood. There is a kind of gentle humor throughout which is achieved more by choosing exactly the right word to describe something rather than by jokes. For instance, she imagines a stable of horses as looking "like an equine rugby team".

Less successful are her attempts at travelog, which seem to take the form of pages culled from her diary. However, overall her technique of darting from subject to subject is enticing as we gain bizarre glimpses into her everyday life (watching tv quizzes in the kitchen) and her philosophy.

This is the most unshowbizzy of memoirs and will find favor with people who enjoy reading biographies generally rather than fans of Absolutely Fabulous, which receives scant mention.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Absolutely Fabulous!, July 22, 2009

By 

Cup of Tea Lady (Atlanta, GA USA) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: No Room for Secrets (Paperback)

This was a lovely read from a lovely woman who has led an absolutely fabulous life! It is rich in tales from India, where she was born, to Switzerland where she was a Bond Girl on `Her Majesty's Secret Service,' to Scotland, the Middle East, the Far East and points beyond. Miss Lumley lets no one define her but herself. She takes you on a tour of her house and each room reminds her of a journey in her life - whether that journey involved modeling, acting, traveling, humanitarian efforts, or just living. She acts as an interviewer of herself and thus can be self-depricating and revealing at the same time. She makes wry observations with a lovely turn of phrase: "If you really want to do something, you'll do it because you can't live with yourself not doing it." (p. 205) Or this one on age: "I don't know whether it's because I'm growing older and can see the sunset from the top of my hill, but I find things more and more fascinating nowadays." (p.257) Absolutely Fabulous, the show, is discussed on eight pages (pp. 158-166) with shorter references throughout but this is a comprehensive tale of a very full life, of which that very funny show was a part but does not comprise the whole. How fascinating that Miss Lumley's grandfather received a Tibetan Buddhist scripture from the 13th Dalai Lama which she plans to return to the 14th Dalai Lama on a trip she is packing for at the end of the book (p. 255). Thank you for sharing your Absolutely Fabulous life with us, Miss Lumley. May your adventures continue on and carry you forth. Looking forward to the next installment!

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars If you like Lumley, this is the book for you!, July 8, 2008

By 

Anonymous (Illinois USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: No Room for Secrets (Hardcover)

She was candid and reflective in her bio, sharing just enough of her life story to make it interesting without it coming across as a confessional or expose. She has a great grasp of details and some history in the book that really made me admire her even more as a person.