Further good news – it’s definitely the book that goes on giving. I’m delighted that my Whitney Straight biography has been shortlisted for the Motoring Book of the Year award at the International Historic Motoring Awards.
Whitney Straight
Shortlisted!
Well this is most gratifying. Next month I shall be returning to the Royal Automobile Club on Pall Mall, where I carried out so much of the research, and where the book was launched.
The Club’s Motoring Book of the Year awards are being held there on 28 October, and my Whitney Straight book has been shortlisted in the ‘motorsport title under £30’ category.
Signing at Autobooks-Aerobooks, Burbank, California, 23 May 2026
Sixteen years and a whole head of curly hair after I last did a signing there, and maybe fourteen after I began my Whitney Straight project, I returned to Autobooks-Aerobooks, the bookshop with the most ideal customer base on the planet, a chequered flag for a floor and another one draped over the signing table. No better place in which to bid farewell to Whitney.
Talk at the Century Association, New York, 30 April 2026
The Century Association, on New York’s West 43rd Street, is a private club founded in 1847. Whitney’s father Willard was once a member, and the family kindly arranged for it to be the base for a celebration of the book’s US launch.
Signing with Ben Horton, Race Retro, Stoneleigh Park, 21 February 2026
Back on Ben Horton’s stand as an author rather than as a punter for the first time in years, signing a few copies of the Whitney book, and chatting about it for his excellent YouTube channel.
Talk at Brooklands Museum, Weybridge, Surrey, 19 February 2026
As the home of British motorsport and aviation, there was no better place than Brooklands Museum to celebrate the life of Whitney Straight, and so many people contributed to a very special day.
Errata in respect of first print run
The book was published on 2 October 2025, and had its first reprint in December, just in time for Christmas.
OTD 1912
Outside on the streets of New York, horseless carriages were vying for supremacy over horse-drawn buggies. Inside the five-storey townhouse on East 67th Street, near the corner with Madison Avenue, Dr Cragin’s attempts to induce the baby had failed. It was clear now that the expectant parents would not get their wish – their first child would not be born on election day.
Talk at Dartington Hall, Dorset, 21 October 2025
Thanks to Adam on sound and a mighty projector, the Dartington Trust‘s Arts Curator Peter Nicholson and I were able to create a convivial atmosphere in the Great Hall as we chatted about Whitney, and how his unique position as Dartington’s eldest founding pupil helped form him
Whitney Straight book launch at the Royal Automobile Club, London, 7 October 2025
The Royal Automobile Club’s Pall Mall clubhouse library was the perfect location for the book launch. I spent many weeks there, maybe even months, poring over books and 1930s magazines, and that lovely long room, lined with oak book shelves and with open fires at each end, is quite literally my favourite room in London.