I hope Bono’s book won’t be prattle and humdrum

IT APPEARS that Bono has been busy during lockdown, tossing off his memoir, Surrender: 40 Songs, One Story.

Presumably, he’ll take a break from cosying up to his new VBF, Ukrainian President Zelensky to promote it in November when it will hit the shelves in good time for the Christmas market, swelling the Hewson coffers even more.

Now I’m no Bono expert, but the question is if Surrender recalls the spirit of the Eighties when Bono and U2 were hailed as true originals, the most exciting thing to come out of Ireland since Guinness and Waterford glass.

Or if it is a worthy and sanitised tome, free of indiscretions about Bill Gates and Bill Clinton and the author’s circle of influential friends, regrets about tinkering in politics and making an ass of himself with Geldof on the world stage, hair-raising accounts of rock ’n’ roll excess or spilling the secrets of his long and happy marriage to his teenage sweetheart and the remarkable harmony in the band.

Perhaps unusually for a rocker, Bono is an exemplary businessman and he knows that however he plays it, whether exhilarating pageturner or turgid self-regarding snooze fest, Surrender will sell like hot cakes.

And that the next time he and the Bills (Gates and Clinton) get together and indeed Prince Harry, the subject of squeezing royalties and advances for memoirs will top the agenda.