Caroline Gascoigne, 'Sunday Times' (U.K.) Immaculately well done.

Tomalin s flawless research and trademark empathy with her subjects should make this portrait of one of the most fascinating characters of 17th-century England the best biography of the autumn. Michiko Kakutani, 'New York Times ' Our greatest diarist, analyzed by one of our greatest biographers. The best work on Pepys since Robert Louis Stevenson s classic essay, published in 1881. Philip Hensher, 'Atlantic Monthly ' Tomalin s writing is as supple and lively as Pepys s own, and by fleshing out the backdrop to his 'Diary 'writings, she has created the perfect bookend to his own rollicking self-portrait. Her research has been not just scrupulously thorough but dazzlingly imaginative. Claire Tomalin s life is a magnificent triumph. It takes an exceptional biographer to go so confidently beyond the apparent totality of daily experience presented in Pepys s 'Diary. Charles McGrath, 'New York Times Book Review,' front cover Brilliantly believable.

Thomas Mallon, 'The New Yorker ' Tomalin not only brings him back to vibrant life, but makes a powerful case that he s more central, more relevant than we ever imagined. Tomalin gives us the rest of the man, and also a startling new way to read him. The Pepys we know lived for only nine years and five months. Most of our images are sourced automatically, so the book cover shown might be different to the edition we have in stock.

This is a used book in good condition, meaning that it shows signs of wear but has no major defects. Within and beyond the narrative of Pepys's extraordinary career, she explores his inner life - his relations with women, his fears and ambitions, his political shifts, his agonies and his delights. Yet the use she makes of it - and of other hitherto unexamined material - is startlingly fresh and original. This diary lies at the heart of Claire Tomalin's biography.

But for nearly ten years he kept a private diary in which he recorded, with unparalleled openness and sensitivity to the turbulent world around him, exactly what it was like to be a young man in Restoration London. Samuel Pepys achieved fame as a naval administrator, a friend and colleague of the powerful and learned, a figure of substance.

Samuel pepys biography claire tomalin