Surrender: 40 Songs, One Story - Book Review

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A good memoir references and connects to the times it is set in. Bono, the lead singer of U2, always seeks to engage with the world whether it be via his music, performance, advocacy and now writing. Throughout his over forty year music career with U2, Bono has sought to connect with others with many classic songs and stadium performances. Surrender is Bono's opportunity to record his origins and along the way the reader taps into his early years and formative experiences, the most painful being the loss of his mother when he was aged fourteen.



The book is divided into forty chapters titled with forty well known U2 songs. Although it is nearly 600 pages long, it is an easy read and many have related how much they enjoy the audio book version, which is read by Bono himself. Bono's writing really shines when he is talking about his early life growing up on Cedarwood Road in a working class area of Dublin. As with many memoirists, their recall of the formative years is related in some detail but with the benefit of a lifetime of hindsight.

There are some beautifully written pieces on his Christian faith and what that means to Bono, his music and band mates, but also some surprising sequences on this topic. While he was in Australia in the 80's he sought hypnosis for voice problems. While under hypnosis he was told to think about the best place he could imagine. He related walking in the country by a river with his best friend. The hypnotist/specialist wanted more details and asked Bono who was this best friend? Bono then says – 'Was it Jesus?' Bono then realised: 'Yes, it was.' To which the hypnotist had difficulty understanding Bono's answer.



In another anecdote, Bono relates how it enrages him to see people ignoring his band by going for a toilet break in the middle of a song - 'You had to pick this song, of all songs, really?' To Bono the worst thing for anyone is to be ignored and following on from this to be wilfully ignorant of the suffering in our world.

There are sections in this book that I will go back and read again, but also some that I felt were purely name dropping, for example, stories about Frank Sinatra and Johnny Cash. These were obviously big influences on Bono, but I am not sure we learn anything revealing about any of them.



I am on the record by saying I am not impressed by the cover, it is not a great photo of Bono, we need to see his entire face. He has developed a habit of drawing over photos and the pictorial photos in the centre of the book feature his doodling on vintage photos, which I suppose he is allowed to do, seeing as they are his photos.



Surrender is about a man taking stock of his life, legacy, heritage, faith and family. He relates seeking out a substitute family all his life following the lack of connection and love from his father. Essentially Bono tries to pull this apart and reconstruct his life and, in the process, illustrates his creative process. I sense this is a crossroads for Bono and indeed U2, but it seems to be in his blood to continue to seek out connection. It is likely we can look forward to hearing much more from Bono in song, performance and on paper.

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