Ghosted autobiographies are often more entertaining than those written unaided because a pair of sensibilities has been brought to the task and these may not comfortably coalesce.
There is a sense that such was the case in this instance as Leonard Lewis, who left school still in his early teens and clearly relished every champagne-swilling moment of his rise to hairdressing heaven, occasionally interrupts his "booze, birds and bad behaviour" narrative for a quick poetic outburst about the artistry of his professional work. Frankly, these are the dull parts of a book which leaves no cliche unexamined, not least that working class boys who make good, behind all that flash, still love their mums and home cooking better than anything else.
Leonard of Mayfair, as he grandly styled himself, grew up on a council estate in Shepherd's Bush, which is not quite London's East End (and today likes to imagine itself the wilder shores of Notting Hill) but nonetheless can be rough enough on occasions.
The combination of a handsome face and personability, a fondness for women and a wish to make easy money drew him to hairdressing. It was never a vocation, but he soon discovered a natural ability and, as a result, even before turning 20 had become well-known and well-off. His headquarters for many years was a house on Upper Grosvenor Street which had once been owned by couturier Elsa Schiaparelli and here he groomed (and sometimes bedded) a succession of people even more famous than himself. Lewis is gratifyingly indiscreet about many former clients; Joan Collins, for example, tends to wear "glamorous wigs to cover her slightly sparse hair" while Tony Curtis once glued on his hairpiece so successfully that when someone attempted to remove it a large section of skin came away too.
Nemesis eventually arrived in 1988 when Lewis was diagnosed with a brain tumour and the accumulation of several decades' debts caused his business to crash. He then became epileptic and his good looks were destroyed by large doses of prescribed drugs. Happy days have come again, but they are of a quieter kind than formerly. Now he lives back with his older sister in the west London home where they were raised. Friends from the profession clubbed together to establish a trust so he would not suffer excessive deprivation. Leonard of Shepherd's Bush may not have quite the same associations with glamour as his former title, but in a book which likes to stress the cyclical nature of life, it seems the most fitting name on which to end.
Robert O'Byrne is an Irish Times journalist