Unbreakable: Longlisted for the William Hill Sports Book of the Year 2023

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In a career spanning over three decades, Ronnie O'Sullivan's journey to becoming the greatest snooker player of all time has been filled with extremes. Ronnie O’Sullivan was in primary school when his father gave him his first proper snooker cue. It was a beauty: a Burwat Champion, made by the company that once supplied Queen Victoria with a snooker table. The cue was second-hand, but Ronnie Sr knew that it — like his son — was special. “The only way he managed to persuade the geezer who owned it to hand it over was giving him a car in return,” O’Sullivan writes. Reading this is like watching an O'Sullivan break: hypnotic, dazzling and impossible to tear yourself away from.' - STEPHEN FRY I’ve not mellowed, in that I’ve changed my personality, but I’ve learned to just not take myself too seriously. I’m much more philosophical.” Now, though, he is able to separate his snooker life from his other interests, and the balance has helped him love the sport again.

Frank Adamson, my first coach, for not spending more time with him in his later years. I feel bad about that. Framed around the many lessons Ronnie has learned from his extraordinary career, Unbreakable takes us beyond the success and record-breaking achievements to share the reality - and brutality - of making it to the very top, whatever your field. Ronnie is the first to say he doesn't have all the answers, but in sharing the experiences that have shaped him and mistakes that have made him, he hopes to help readers navigate their own personal challenges and obstacles, and in turn reach their maximum potential. O’Sullivan fell short in his bid to win an eighth world title last month, losing in the quarter-finals to eventual champion Luca Brecel.

First night reviews

Reaching a new stage in his snooker career, Ronnie admitted his love of the game, and his incredible talent, is beginning to outweighing his need to win.

Unfortunately for Francisco Garcia, last year the BBC ran a documentary and a podcast series revisiting the case, and so there is little in We All Go into the Dark that feels truly new: reclaiming the stories of the victims; the 1996 exhumation of the suspect John McInnes for DNA testing (spoiler: it wasn’t him); the possibility that Bible John was actually the serial killer Peter Tobin (a theory here discredited by the detective who caught Tobin). Most interesting are Garcia’s interviews with those directly involved in the case over the decades – crime reporters, detectives, a pathologist – and the underlying social history of how bogeymen come to be. Marc writes (main picture): I specifically focused on the South Africa captain Siya Kolisi, far left, as he sung the national anthem, Nkosi Sikelel’ iAfrika, as he sings with so much passion and emotion. Now it feels a lot better: everyone is just in a better place. I just want to see her and her daughter [Rouass has a teenage daughter from a previous relationship] and her family, who are like my family, happy.”The deaths of innumerable indigenous Americans from infections brought by the first European colonists left the newcomers short of cheap labour, he notes, In the new tome, Ronnie writes about his 31-year career, from being a teenage snooker prodigy and winning titles within a year of turning professional to becoming the greatest snooker player of all time and breaking world records. In some ways, he is looking forward to his snooker career coming to an end — he predicts he may continue for another couple of years, or longer — but while he’s still doing well, he won’t quit. O’Sullivan has been described as “the most naturally gifted player ever”. He was potting balls from age seven and had scored his first century by 10, beating all in his wake before turning professional at 16.