Losing My Virginity: the Autobiography

Branson, Richard

ISBN 10: 1852276843 / ISBN 13: 9781852276843

Published by Virgin Publishing Ltd, London, 1998

About this Item

488 pages, illustrated, appendices, index, light creasing and fading to dust jacket, signed on the flyleaf by Richard Branson with the message "Many, many thanks for making this book possible. Here's to you and your family! Happy Xmas! Kind regards, Richard Branson".

Seller Inventory # 166954

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Losing My Virginity: the Autobiography
• Publisher: Virgin Publishing Ltd, London
• Publication Date: 1998
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1852276843
• ISBN 13: 9781852276843
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: 1st Edition
• Condition: Very Good
• Dust Jacket Condition: Good
• Signed: Signed by Author(s)

About this title

Synopsis

Libro usado en buenas condiciones, por su antiguedad podria contener señales normales de uso

Review

In this autobiography, Virgin Group founder Richard Branson says one of his prime business criteria is "fun." Fun made Branson a billionaire, and few business memoirs are one-billionth as fun as Branson's, nor as niftily written. Not only does it relate his side of near-death corporate experiences, it tells how the chairman literally cheated death by gun, shipwreck, and balloon crash.

Branson's empire--now encompassing interests in an airline, pop music, soda pop, e-commerce, and financial services--began when the dyslexic 16-year-old dropped out of school in 1968 to found the British magazine Student. His headmaster said, "I predict that you will either go to prison or become a millionaire." Briefly imprisoned for dodging customs selling records, Branson got his first million by releasing Tubular Bells, a maverick recording all the stuffy executives rejected. (1998's Tubular Bells III puts the series' sales over 20 million.)

Despite wild tales of Branson's wife-swapping and Keith Richards fleeing naked from Branson's studio at gunpoint with another man's woman, the most shocking parts of the memoir concern British Airways' James Bond-like "dirty tricks" campaign against Virgin Atlantic, resulting in the biggest award for damages in English history.

Though it's filled with famous names, witty quotes, and pulse-pounding accounts of lunatic balloon adventures, it is as a business thriller that the book really scores. His instinctive bet-the-ranch tactics could cost him all, or earn another billion. Either way, Branson will likely remain the most entertaining entrepreneur in Europe. --Tim Appelo