Last Train to Memphis
The Rise of Elvis Presley - 'The richest portrait of Presley we have ever had' Sunday Telegraph
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Written with grace, humour, and affection, Last Train to Memphis has been hailed as the definitive biography of Elvis Presley
'Elvis steps from the pages. You can feel him breathe' BOB DYLAN
'Wonderful' RODDY DOYLE
'Soars above all other accounts of Elvis' Guardian
'A triumph of biographical art... profound and moving' New York Times
Last Train to Memphis is arguably the first serious biography that refuses to dwell on the myth of Elvis. Aiming instead to portray in vivid, dramatic terms the life and career of this outstanding artistic and cultural phenomenon, it draws together a plethora of documentary and interview material to create a superbly coherent and plausible narrative. The first of two volumes, covering Presley's rise to prominence up to his departure for Germany in 1958, Last Train to Memphis is undoubtedly the benchmark by which other biographies of him are judged.
- Published: Apr 23 2026
- Pages: 592
- ISBN: 9781399641463
Press Reviews
- SUNDAY TELEGRAPH
A wonderful book...Guralnick gives us an Elvis of real flesh and blood...the richest and most detailed protrait of Presely we have ever had.
- Wonderful…Guralnick deserves to live in Graceland - RODDY DOYLE
Unrivalled...Elvis steps out of these pages, you can feel him breathe, this book cancels out all others - BOB DYLAN
- roll's founding father--and when no less an authority than Bob Dylan writes that "this book cancels out all others", you know Guralnick must be doing something right. Exhaustive and thorough, though always written from a sympathetic standpoint, this first
Last Train to Memphis is the first part of Peter Gurlanick's epic two-volume life of rock 'n
- Patrick Humphries, AMAZON.CO.UK REVIEW
Guralnick is a scrupulous biographer, now established as the definitive chronicler of the strange life and turbulent times of Elvis Presley; better still, his enthusiasm for Elvi s' music shines through on every page of the text. And in the end, after all
- Bob Dylan
Unrivalled... Elvis steps from the pages. You can feel him breathe. This book cancels out all others
- Sunday Telegraph
A wonderful book... Guralnick gives us an Elvis of real flesh and blood... the richest and most detailed portrait of Presley we have ever had
- Roddy Doyle
Wonderful... Guralnick deserves to live in Graceland
- New York Times Book Review
A triumph of biographical art... profound and moving... Even the minor revelations are positively spellbinding... Guralnick's narrative is rendered with an intimate, restrained intensity eerily reminiscent of the plaintive tone of Presley's ballads, that tremulous yearning of America itself
- Time
Altogether splendid... It is the particular and spectacular achievement of Last Train to Memphis that it holds both the making of the history and the beginning of the myth in firm, simple and compassionate focus... Guralnick paints this world with perspective, respect and great decency; it is one of the book's triumphs
- Kirkus
Guralnick takes a sensible and sensitive approach, tracing the roots of an American dream... Guralnick perfectly captures Elvis's mixture of naivety and shrewdness... A serious, musically literate and historically attuned biography. An American epic that belongs on every bookshelf
- Irish Times
The first definitive work on Presley's life
- Guardian
Soars above all other books-for-bucks accounts of Elvis... Excellent
- Daily Telegraph
The adjective 'definitive' seems almost inadequate
- Time Out
The writer's decades of research leap off the page. A classic
- Mojo
It's hard to reclaim Elvis from the weight of history and slander, but Guralnick does it beautifully... [He] tells this 20th century myth with a fine regard for his subject's humanity