Music journalist and reporter Lesley-Ann Jones conducted more than 100 interviews in assembling this fine book on the late singer of Queen. She spoke with Freddie Mercury's friends, managers, promoters, musician friends and a coterie of acquaintances in order to create her biography. Though she met Mercury several times, she never officially interviewed him. That's not surprising. Firstly, the singer rarely did interviews because he despised the press. And secondly and more generally, most biographies on musicians are written by journalists who have never met--much less spoken to--the people they're writing about. It seems odd and unnatural, but that's the way it is. But even without this type of close encounter, informative books can certainly be written from a distance.

Jones kicks off the book with Queen's performance at Live Aid ("Of all Queen's 704 live performances fronted by Freddie, it remains their most iconic, their finest hour") then covers the arc of his life from growing up in Zanzibar, moving to the UK and joining Queen to his rise to fame, homosexuality, ascent to iconic status and ultimate death.

She is a practiced writer with a lot of skill. Much has already been written about the famous singer, but somehow Jones manages to shed new light on Mercury to uncover things we never knew about before.