The Unknown Kimi Raikkonen

'I loved it. I thought it was fascinating - really, really interesting story that he's got to tell... I've known him for years and I learned an awful lot.' Marc Priestley? Kimi Räikkönen is the Finnish superstar Formula One driver with a reputation for being fast on the track and silent off it – until now! In this superb and authorised portrait of Räikkönen, Kari Hotakainen gets to reveal the side of the man that few beyond his close family and friends have ever seen. Enigmatic and private, Ferrari’s former world champion driver rarely opens up to outsiders, but he granted Hotakainen exclusive access to his world and to his way of thinking. It ensures that this will be a book that will delight all fans of motorsport, who have long revered the Finn. Including never-previously-seen photographs from his own collection, The Unknown Kimi Räikkönen takes the reader into the heart of the action at grands prix around the world, behind the scenes as race strategies are planned, and opens up the private side of his life that he normally guards so carefully. With all the cult appeal of I Am Zlatan Ibrahimovic, the raw excitement of Formula One and the insight of the best biographies, this is a book every sports fan will want to treasure.

LONGLISTED FOR THE WILLIAM HILL SPORTS BOOK OF THE YEAR 2018 This is my life, not the stuff you've seen, but the things you haven't. This is my childhood growing up in the West Country, my struggles, my doubts and my hopes. It's the people I've met in my seventeen years in Formula One, many of whom I've loved, some of whom I definitely haven't. It's the laughs I've shared, the battles I've fought, some on the track with rivals and friends like Fernando Alonso, Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel. It's the pressure I struggled with as I closed in on my World Championship in 2009, it's the calm I felt every time I settled into the cockpit. It's my dad - the many times he saved me, the one moment he doubted me, the hole in my life he left me. It's everything in one go, the good days as well as the bad. A life lived not just as a racing driver but, ultimately, as a human being.

A fascinating insider's look at life behind-the-scenes at Formula One. 'An essential read' AUTOSPORT 'A must for the real inside story' FORMULA 1 RACING 'Recommended for anyone interested in F1 on the inside' MOTORING NEWS Formula One Grand Prix mechanic Steve Matchett takes the reader on a compelling journey through his life in the pit-lane, from his beginnings as a young apprentice, through his time at Ferrari and BMW to his later success with Benetton. He gives eye-witness views of the great drivers, including Michael Schumacher, Nigel Mansell, Alain Prost and Ayrton Senna. He also talks of key Benetton personalities, and explains how the team was transformed into a strong, competitive organisation, winning three World Championships. His determination and frustration in trying - and eventually succeeding - to break into the high-pressure world of Formula One leaps off the page.

Meet Marc 'Elvis' Priestley: the former number-one McLaren mechanic, and the brains behind some of Formula One's greatest ever drivers. Revealing the most outrageous secrets and fiercest rivalries, The Mechanic follows Priestley as he travels the world working in the high-octane atmosphere of the F1 pit lane. While the spotlight is most often on the superstar drivers, the mechanics are the guys who make every World Champion, and any mistakes can have critical consequences. However, these highly skilled engineers don't just fine-tune machinery and crunch data through high-spec computers. These boys can seriously let their hair down. Whether it's partying on luxury yachts or gravity-defying photos aboard aeroplanes, this is a world which thrills on and off the track. This is Formula One, but not like you've seen it before.

Niki Lauda drove a car for sport, but crossed the line between life and death and fought back to even greater glory. Even people who know nothing of Formula One have heard of his crash at Nurburgring in 1976, when we was dragged from the inferno of his Ferrari so badly injured he was given the last rites. Within 33 days, he was racing again at Monza. His wounds bled, he had no eyelids. He was terrified. A year later, he reclaimed his World Championship title. In To Hell and Back he reveals how he battled fear to stage a comeback that seemed beyond human endurance. Then it’s Lauda vs Hunt, an epic rivalry later dramatized in 2013’s Hollywood blockbuster Rush, and he looks back on the strict childhood and parental disapproval that he believes gave him an ‘addiction to excellence’. There’ll never be another like him.

Rakoshi Devis came to me as a shock since they happened to rescue my senses at a time when extreme anger overwhelmed my consciousness and it was waiting to annihilate my sanity. They salvaged me from the predicament of devastation which hovered around me like an eagle waiting to pounce upon its prey. The Rakoshi Devis I saw in my vision were three gruesome-looking figures ready to overthrow conventional wisdom that often enforces the norm of propriety on a woman. These introduced themselves to me as strong opponents of the egocentric MANHOOD that’s born to obliterate feminine identity. A ‘Demonic Man’ happens to challenge the Devis’ feminine prowess; not evidently by oppressing them but implicitly until he brings them to the point where they become vulnerable to his attack. The Rakoshis then blend their feminine benignity with their demonic ire and manifest themselves into a transformed version of the fierce ‘Demonic Goddess’ to counteract the refractory Egoistic Masculine Vampire.”

Calling all petrolheads, Lights Out, Full Throttle is the riotously funny tour through the best, worst and downright outrageous of F1. Shortlisted for the Telegraph Sports Entertainment Book of the Year Award Johnny and Damon have become the one constant for passionate British F1 fans in a rapidly changing landscape. They have earned cult status as commentators and pundits, with viewers loving their unerring dedication to the sport’s greatness. From Monaco to Silverstone – discussing Johnny’s crowdsurfing and Bernie’s burger bar, the genius of Adrian Newey and Colin Chapman, what it’s like to have an out-of-body experience while driving a car in the pouring rain at 200 mph, and the future of the sport in the wake of a tumultuous year – Johnny and Damon assess the good, the bad and the ugly of the F1 enthusiast’s paradise. Whether you’re a fan of Nigel, Niki, Kimi or Britney, pine for the glory days of Brabham, Williams, Jim Clark and Fangio, or believe that Lewis Hamilton will retire as the GOAT, Lights Out, Full Throttle gets you to the front of the grid without the inconvenience of having to leave your seat.

A burnt-out author, who can no longer mine material from his own life for his novels, "buys" the life of an elderly woman he meets at a book fair. In exchange for his last few thousand euros, the woman, Salme Malmikunnas, a retired yarn and button saleswoman, relates her life story over the course of two interviews held in a secluded highway cafe. The author is instantly reinvigorated, but the two soon come into conflict over the degree to which he may embellish Salme's reminiscences. His imagination begins to run wild with the lives of her three children, and as they all lurch from crisis to crisis, Salme founders in the shifting sands of the little white lies they have told her, and the fabrications of her new friend. The Human Part is at once an absurdist meditation on the relationship between truth and falsehood in fiction and a panoramic state-of-the-nation novel. Racism, communism, the global financial crisis and the literary legacies of Finland's finest writers are all dissected. There are shades of George Pennac's masterpiece, Life: A User's Manual, in the subtly oblique angle of Hotakainen's approach.