This book shares John's story with compassion and honesty. Bill Jones does an excellent job of painting a picture of the brilliant artist and a complex person John was.

‘Alone’ by Bill Jones has clearly been well researched, with the full cooperation of Curry’s family and friends. The book is nicely written and I don’t doubt any of the facts mentioned, but it is an inadequate portrait of the man and his work. The author is not a dance expert or even a dance fan. The other problem is that Bill Jones clearly doesn’t like Curry – he has read all the letters, heard all the reports of his temperament and has been unable to overcome his impression that John was both selfish and nasty. The book has nothing to say about John’s work in terms of its influences and its place in dance history – not Jones’ fault as he just doesn’t ‘get it’ himself. ( examples: much of John’s own choreography was directly built on various Royal Ballet works – this needs detailed analysis. In my view his own choreography did not work as well as the works created by others – MacMillan, Maen, Martins, Tharp etc – but there was no analysis of this either. The book talks of Toller Cranston as if he was a comparable artist to John Curry – as if they were rivals in a real sense. Anyone who understands dance would know that Cranston was just an acrobat and that Curry’s contempt for Cranston’s claims to artistry were not arrogance but honesty.) The book fails completely to explain why so many people adored John in spite of all his faults. It would not surprise me if the recent book has left John’s family and friends with a great sense of betrayal. Their honest revelations of John’s faults have been used to launch more and more unpleasant allegations against him – for example he is accused of being snobbish and elitist on the basis of stupid remarks in private letters written at the age of 16! I would recommend the book only because it has a huge amount of factual detail and the quotations from friends are valuable for anyone who knows how to interpret them. However, I feel that it is very important that someone with real insight and appreciation of dancing writes the story of his life and work - Bill Jones is a good writer and journalist but dance is not a language he speaks. At the centre of this book is a huge vacuum which should contain analysis of his place in dance history and the genius of his work.