An exceptionally vivid and penetrating insight into Hollywood film-making . . . Qualifies for that exclusive niche reserved for film star memoirs that are worth much more than a casual flick on the bookshop shelf' Jonathan Coe, Observer

Two pages into the script and an ache has developed in my gonads - I am both laughing out loud and agonized by the fact that the Withnail part is such a corker that not in a billion bank holidays will they ever seriously consider me.

When, in the summer of 1986, Richard E. Grant was cast as the lead in Withnail and I, his whole world shifted and he was set firmly on the path to international stardom. With Nails is his outrageous, irreverent and brutally funny account of that time and the years afterwards, of his self-doubt and anxiety on the route to Hollywood, and of all the extraordinary, mad, brilliant people in the film business.

From drinking himself incoherent so he could film Withnail and I to a night spent in Paris's red-light district with a world-famous couple, to working with Hollywood's biggest actors and directors, Richard E. Grant - always eloquent, always honest - has documented, in his own inimitable style, what it is to become a film star. There is no book quite like it.

'An exceptionally vivid and penetrating insight into Hollywood film-making' Jonathan Coe, Observer

'Funny, bitchy, utterly fascinating' Independent on Sunday

Proves he can be as witty on paper as he has been on the big screen with this diary of his experiences working with everyone from Paul McGann to Steve Martin . . . an enjoyable read that goes to prove there is at least one true gentleman working in Hollywood