{"title":"Books by John Pearson","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"9780008150280","title":"The Profession of Violence","description":"The classic, bestselling account of the infamous Kray twins, now a major film, starring Tom Hardy.Reggie and Ronnie Kray ruled London’s gangland during the 60s with a ruthlessness and viciousness that shocks even now. Building an empire of organised crime that has never been matched, the brothers swindled, extorted and terrorised – while enjoying a glittering celebrity status at the heart of the swinging 60s scene, until their downfall and imprisonment for life.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56220803760501,"sku":"9780008150280","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780008150280_3967bf46-e7dc-4bf5-9947-a531a4eb0343.jpg?v=1785658802"},{"product_id":"9780008150273","title":"The Profession of Violence","description":"The classic, bestselling account of the infamous Kray twins, now a major film, starring Tom Hardy.Reggie and Ronnie Kray ruled London’s gangland during the 60s with a ruthlessness and viciousness that shocks even now. Building an empire of organised crime that has never been matched, the brothers swindled, extorted and terrorised – while enjoying a glittering celebrity status at the heart of the swinging 60s scene, until their downfall and imprisonment for life.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56221198975349,"sku":"9780008150273","price":10.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780008150273_4105c71d-b820-47f7-9dfc-52046d0d8246.jpg?v=1786033089"},{"product_id":"9780008281533","title":"All the Money in the World","description":"\u003cp\u003eInspired by the fortunes and misfortunes of the Getty family, whose most extraordinary and troubled episode – the kidnap and ransom of grandson Paul Getty – is now a major motion picture, directed by Ridley Scott, from a screenplay written by David Scarpa and starring Michelle Williams, Christopher Plummer and Mark Wahlberg.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhen sixteen-year-old Paul Getty was kidnapped, the news exploded worldwide. But his grandfather, J. Paul Getty, the richest living American, refused to pay the ransom, oblivious to his sufferings. And as the days dragged painfully on, it was Paul’s distraught but determined mother Gail who was left to negotiate with his captors…\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn this full biography of the Getty family, John Pearson traces the creation of their phenomenal wealth and the ways in which it has touched and tainted the lives of various generations. Packed with colourful characters, bitter feuds and unexpected turns, it is a riveting insight into the lives of the super-rich.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePreviously published as Painfully Rich. Motion Picture Artwork ©2017 CTMG. All Rights Reserved.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56221400990069,"sku":"9780008281533","price":8.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780008281533_2f339d8a-b453-4467-bb63-1c3eb7017a4e.jpg?v=1785658794"},{"product_id":"9780752847948","title":"The Cult Of Violence","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eJohn Pearson, author of the bestselling definitive book on the Krays, THE PROFESSION OF VIOLENCE, re-examines the bizarre and frightening story of the Kray twins including new revelations about their criminal past, trial and their extraordinary activities in gaol.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eJohn Pearson knows more about the Krays than anyone alive. His book THE PROFESSION OF VIOLENCE was published 28 years ago to huge acclaim and is still in print today in paperback. The Krays film was based on the book and it was Pearson who exposed the Boothby connection in 1994. In 1967, the year before they were arrested, the twins asked Pearson to write their biography. He remained a confidant of the family and the brothers throughout their trial and prison years. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eReg was in prison for 33 years although the judge recommended 30 years and was only released when he was diagnosed with inoperable cancer and given weeks to live. Using the trail as the fulcrum for the narrative, Pearson, in this completely new book, will revisit the twins criminal past, including a raft of new material hitherto unpublished. The trial will be re-examined (he still has contact with the living trial lawyers) and he will look at their time in gaol (including Ronnie's bizarre life in Broadmore) and examine what it is about the Krays which, at the time and over the next thirty years, made them 'criminal celebrities'. On the one hand they were pursued by a fascinated media who wanted to re-create these two brutal murderers as folk heroes, and on the other they were demonised by an establishment ashamed of the way it had embraced them. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ePearson will examine just why successive Home Secretaries found it too unpalatable to release the twins when so many other less well-known, but possibly more unsavoury murderers and criminals, were released after serving a fraction of their time. This is a timely book and, with Reg's death, Pearson is now at liberty to tell the whole amazing, fascinating story.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56294695240053,"sku":"9780752847948","price":10.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780752847948_a6971adb-c7c1-483b-b70b-0c1f212eab39.jpg?v=1786015716"},{"product_id":"9781448208005","title":"Biggles","description":"For over fifty years James Biggles Worth, D.S.O., D.F.C., M.C., has flown the skies. The mythical ace to end all flying aces, the fearless pilot of everything from Sop with Camels to the earliest jets, he emerged with glory from devilish scrapes all over the world.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eYet until now Biggles has often been seen as a storybook caricature. A dashed fine chap, certainly. But not the extraordinary man he really was. Here, for the first time, is an insight into the 'real' man who made these adventures possible. John Pearson has unravelled the missing strands in Biggles' life; delving vigorously into subjects that were once taboo.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhy did Biggles never marry? What was the truth about his tragic first love? And what were Biggles' real regrets and frustrations as he tried to come to terms with a rapidly developing world in peacetime? The truth - so long hidden behind a stiff upper lip and an equally stiff pink gin in the Officers' Mess - is at last revealed.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56300121981301,"sku":"9781448208005","price":15.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781448208005_b8dc8743-88cf-47ab-9097-449f028b2086.jpg?v=1786020648"},{"product_id":"9781954928268","title":"Iron Maiden: Piece of Mind","description":"40 years have passed since the release of PIECE OF MIND. More than an album, it was a thunderous statement of intent by a band whose meteoric rise from the East End of London would propel them to the world stage, thrusting them into the realms of legend. This commemorative tome, containing comics, art, and remembrances from acclaimed writers, artists, musicians and storytellers, is a powerful celebration of the unparalleled vision which inspired them -- the living legend that is IRON MAIDEN.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56309197963637,"sku":"9781954928268","price":30.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781954928268_74e51f95-d745-43d9-b479-70df67c29b3d.jpg?v=1786030427"},{"product_id":"9781915797148","title":"James Bond: the Authorised Biography","description":"'It was a strong face, certainly - the eyes pale grey and very cold, the mouth was hard, the dark hair - grey-streaked now - still fell in the authentic comma over the forehead.' This is how John Pearson reacted to his first encounter with the real James Bond, an encounter probably unique in the annals of thriller writing. He went on to write the bestselling authorised biography of Ian Fleming. At the time, like most of the world he assumed that James Bond was nothing more than a character in Fleming's highly charged imagination. Then he began to have his doubts. Doubts which were reaching such a pitch that the British secret service were trying to warn him off the scent. Despite this, he finally became convinced that James Bond was not only real, but actually alive. Thanks to a change in policy within the secret service he was invited to embark upon a companion volume to his life of Fleming. This resulting book must be one of the most extraordinary biographies of our times - the authorised life of a myth, the official biography of James Bond.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56309476393333,"sku":"9781915797148","price":9.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781915797148_2f486a96-0fa6-4fee-b877-5424b5fa24f1.jpg?v=1786030333"},{"product_id":"one-of-the-family","title":"One Of The Family","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eAt Ronnie Kray's funeral, London crime expert John Pearson saw a man he didn't recognise - but who all the notorious criminals present deferred to.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eThis is the remarkable true story of that man: 'the Englishman'.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eInvestigations revealed that the Englishman was never mentioned in any of the previous books on organised crime, not because he wasn't involved, but because everyone was too scared to speak his name. Moreover, he was as legendary a figure on the streets of New York as on the streets of London.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ePearson persuaded the mysterious criminal leader to talk to him - and the result was a story even more extraordinary than that of the Kray twins. Here Pearson reveals the true story of the Englishman who became the adopted son of Joey Pagano, the head of one of the major New York crime families. Here the Englishman tells the story that no-one else dared to tell.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eJohn Pearson's \u003ci\u003eThe Profession of Violence\u003c\/i\u003e created the myth of the Kray twins, and remains a classic of true crime and the principal work on East London criminals.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57466649346421,"sku":"9780099457787","price":10.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780099457787.jpg?v=1785654707"},{"product_id":"gamblers","title":"The Gamblers","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eBritain's foremost writer on crime turns to the disappearance of Lord Lucan. The basis of the upcoming ITV drama, Lucan, starring Rory Kinnear and Christopher Eccleston\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFor over thirty years, John Pearson has provided us with literary exposures of some of the most enigmatic people and underground organisations of our modern world. \u003ci\u003eThe Gamblers\u003c\/i\u003e follows the fortunes of five men at the centre of the ultra-fashionable Clermont Set: the Clermont Club's eccentric founder John Aspinall; Dominic Elwes, who was to betray the Set's code of silence; the socialite owner of Annabel's, Mark Birley; the womanising, multi millionaire James Goldsmith; and the infamous Lord 'Lucky' Lucan.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAt the heart of the Set lay a belief that risk-takers are the people who make civilisation tick.Cruel, heartless and snobbish, they gambled with their fortunes and kept a stiff upper lip when they lost.This and a loyalty to each other that transcended everything else enabled them to rise above crises such as the long affair between Birley's wife and James Goldsmith, and the facial mutilation of the Birley's son by one of Aspinall's tigers.Pearson revels in the charisma, charm and wit of these dastardly but debonair millionaires, and reveals how their code led to one of the great unsolved mysteries of the twentieth century.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57492162314613,"sku":"9780099461180","price":16.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780099461180.jpg?v=1786528958"},{"product_id":"ian-fleming-the-notes","title":"Ian Fleming - The Notes","description":"For fans of James Bond and Ian Fleming, here are the meticulous biographical notes that John Pearson made in 1965 while researching Ian Fleming. John Pearson occupies a unique role in the world of Bond. He has the distinction of being James Bond's only authorised biographer and his celebrated work, The Life of Ian Fleming was the first book about Fleming ever to be published. Ian Fleming - The Notes is a book about writing a book. It charts not only Fleming's life but Pearson's own journey while investigating his subject. Compelling, insightful, irreverent and written in John Pearson's inimitable style, it includes fascinating details, letters and interviews that never made it into the finished biography.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57510101877109,"sku":"9781915797612","price":25.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781915797612.jpg?v=1790608926"}],"url":"https:\/\/backstory.london\/collections\/author-john-pearson.oembed","provider":"Backstory","version":"1.0","type":"link"}