I was the subject of a lot of teasing from friends and family for my glowing review of learning to fly (sic) by ex Spice Girl Victoria (Posh) Beckham. Admittedly, it's hardly great literature but it was entertaining and I did thoroughly enjoy it, which to me is what reading is all about. The friend who recently presented me with Catch A Fire, Melanie B's autobiography, did so tongue-in-cheek, remarking that since my taste in books had obviously fallen to a new low, I should enjoy it. Well, the joke was on him because I did!
The first thing that I noticed on opening the book was that all the chapters were song titles - very clever, I thought. The first chapter, "Walking on Broken Glass" deals with the end of Mel's marriage to dancer Jimmy Gulzar. From then on, her autobiography takes a more conventional route by revisiting her childhood, progressing through her teens to the Spice Girls before finally revisiting her courtship and eventual marriage in more detail. The last few pages of the book examine her solo career, which seems to be moving towards acting and TV presenting.
Born to a white woman and her black husband, Mel was a mixed-race child in the days when such children were rare. Despite having two very balanced parents, Mel spent her childhood standing out in the crowd as neither one thing nor another. She was a hyperactive child, filled with boundless energy and, almost in a desperate attempt to tire her out, she was enrolled in dancing classes to which she took like a duck to water.
She tells of neglecting her studies at school to take on her first professional dancing job in spite of the disapproval of her father, a strict disciplinarian. Indeed she initially made her living as a dancer, apart from a few brief and unsuccessful spells doing office work, until auditioning for and becoming a member of the Spice Girls.
Mel's behind the scenes view of the Spice Girls phenomenon is fascinating. In one month alone they performed in Zurich, Frankfurt, Bologna, Rome, Milan, Marseille, Barcelona, Madrid, Lyons, Lausanne, Paris, Munich and Antwerp! It was a punishing schedule that Mel found exhausting, often suffering from homesickness. Yet, for her, performing on stage is the buzz that makes it all worthwhile.
Catch A Fire struck me as being a very honest book. Mel B. seems to bend over backwards to be fair, pointing out, for example, that the story of her marriage break up is only her side of the story and that her ex husband would no doubt have different views. Neither does she always paint herself in the best light, as when admitting to being rather cruel to Sporty during their early days as members of the Spice Girls. The only part of her life that is not open to scrutiny is her daughter Phoenix Chi - as the author points out, when Phoenix is old enough she can decide for herself whether or not she wants publicity and, until then, Phoenix is a no-go area. That said, she does appear in a couple of photographs in the book. There are four sections of photographs in total, almost all colour and all delightful.
Mel B. writes with a tremendous energy and a great deal of humour, although I must confess to tiring of reading variations on "I nearly pooed my pants!" which is her stock description of excitement, fear, nerves, shock and many other emotions. She appears to be a woman with her head in the stars and her feet firmly rooted in her hometown of Leeds.
There is rather a lot of sex written about in Catch A Fire although without lurid details. There are also a lot of four-letter words, although most have been asterisked. Mel B. writes exactly as she appears in TV interviews - feisty, sassy, talking a mile a minute and not seeming to care whose toes she treads on. Although I was never a big fan of the Spice Girls, I found her book a truly entertaining read.
Publisher: Headline
ISBN: 0 7553 1062 4
Price: £17.99
Date Reviewed: Spetember 2002
My Rating: 4/5
