James Rhodes was born in London in 1975. A keen piano player, he was offered a scholarship when he was eighteen at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, but went to Edinburgh University instead. James stopped playing the piano entirely and dropped out after a year. After twelve months working at Burger King in Paris, he went to University College, London to read psychology. He then worked in the City for five years. After a period of personal crisis, he took up the piano again. He is now a professional and acclaimed concert pianist, writer and TV presenter.

Bravo to a survivor who refused to be silenced . . . What really marks this book out is his confrontation with the unsaid (or rarely said) aspects of child sexual abuse and mental illness . . . Some of these thoughts verge on the taboo and it takes clarity, courage and intelligence to say them as plainly and honestly as Rhodes does

Instrumental is no 'misery memoir' . . . I have rarely read so cogent account of the nature of victimhood . . . Visceral and palpable . . . Among the most powerful pages I've read all year

A mesmeric combination of vivid, keen, obsessive precision and raw, urgent energy

Thrilling and harrowing . . . Unsurpassed and unsurpassable

A poet once said great books help you to live your life. They also help you survive your ruin, and James Rhodes's Instrumental is a masterpiece of creative endurance. His passion is his programme, his heart is his true instrument, and you might not read a more moral or more loving book this decade

There is an insight, often startling but always valuable, on almost every page . . . a tough, riveting read

"You might expect James Rhodes to have been crushed by his experiences. On the contrary I don't think I've ever read an autobiography which is this exuberant, this full of life, this addictively readable

We're locked inside his head for long periods and it's a manic place to be. But he is brilliant . . . and insightful . . . James Rhodes writes at full volume

The Supreme Court overthrew an injunction unanimously in May 2015, saying: 'A person who has suffered in the way that [James Rhodes] has suffered, and has struggled to cope with the consequences of his suffering in the way that he has struggled, has the right to tell the world about it. And there is a corresponding public interest in others being able to listen to his life story in all its searing detail

A searingly honest, moving and compelling account of a life damaged by abuse but saved by music. James Rhodes is a rare and gifted spirit with something vital to tell us all. This is a tough but beautiful book

The publishing sensation of the year