Fascinating and revelatory as I really knew very little about Elvis, despite listening to 50’s rock on a near daily basis. I had no idea what a genius he was beyond his live performance ability. I can see why the negative reviews cite the overwhelming amount of detail, but as an audiobook I thought it was excellent. You really get to know both Elvis and the people around him, and I have to say, he’s incredibly likable. We’ll see what happens in the next book.

Not just a book of Elvis, but a concise summary of a fascinating point in time. The "South" was still the south. Hollywood still the dream. The beginnings of real change and true commercialism on the horizon, yet still a country incredibly naive and wholly unprepared for the coming storm. This "history book" of music and the 50's is also the exciting and yet already somewhat sad story of Elvis (even though this is his journey on the way up!). This musical visionary yet strange Mama's boy, overly dependant on a very strange cast of characters surrounding him, appears as a train wreck waiting to happen. As we all know, the wreck arrives in Guralnick's following book. Solid 4 star book!!

The cultural revolution that Elvis brought on was a confluence of timing that fit the universe so perfectly in the 1950s and catapulted his shift to cultural icon in a triumphant rags to riches story. While outwardly triumphant, Guralnick does a fantastic job of showcasing Elvis’s early life - the good and the bad - with empathy, respect, and detail. Granted this book isn’t for everyone - it’s a long and meticulous info dump - but it’s worth a read if you’re a fan or simply fascinated.

enjoyable listen, great pace and lots of personal information from those around Elivis as he grew into stardom

A great bio, one of two, about Elvis and his world.

I get the impression that, at least at this time, he was a humble and kind man, before it got too crazy.

This runs from his childhood to the end of 1958, when his beloved mother died, then he was shipped off to Germany in the Army.

Up to then, it's a whirlwind of songs and tours and attacks for impropriety. He drove a wedge between young and old, as many/most music heroes do.

I also get the impression he was profoundly lonely, trying to surround himself with friends and spending his sudden wealth to try to make himself, his family and friends happy. And as much as he had companionship, nobody around him could or would ever understand what it was like to be him.

As his world was changing radically, just as he got drafted, an old girlfriend visited him at Graceland. She asked him why he didn't just jump off the carousel while he still had his sanity. He said it was too late, that there were too many people dependent on him.

Guralnick has a way of writing as though he was talking, haltingly, backtracking and emphasizing points. It's really entertaining and unexpected.

Part one of a two part biography on Elvis. Very well written (and much better than any other biography I've read) and ends with him leaving on the boat to Germany with the Army.

It gives a lot of really good background on his beginnings and shows that, despite not being that long ago, the 1950s were really a different time entirely, especially in the music industry.

I would recommend and will be reading part 2.

#SelfTaughtHistory

It starts out pretty slow but as his career picks up, so does the rhythm of the novel. An interesting look into the early years.

Last Train to Memphis: The Rise of Elvis Presley is beautifully written portrait of Presley's early years -- his impoverished childhood in Tupelo, Mississippi, the move to Memphis in his teenage years, and the amazingly rich and complex soup of musical influences that city offered to a shy, sensitive boy with a huge love of singing and music of all kinds.

The Elvis you meet in this book is not the troubled, larger-than life, jumpsuit-wearing star of the Vegas years that may first spring to mind when you think of him. Instead author Peter Guralnick introduces us to a churchgoing, family-loving, polite, humble, kindhearted young man who didn't quite fit in anywhere until he knocked (timidly but tenaciously...and repeatedly) on the door of Sun Records in Memphis, eager to make music and have Sun founder Sam Phillips hear him. Once the ball got rolling at Sun, things happened fast. Guralnick paints a vivid picture of lengthy but creatively exhilarating recording sessions, nonstop road trips to play gigs in small towns throughout the South, and the mounting hysteria surrounding this young man (only 21 when he hit it big on the national scene, aided by the smarmy but undeniably effective huckster "Colonel" Tom Parker) as his fame and wealth exploded. Soon he was off to Hollywood, where he dreamed of becoming a dramatic actor like his heroes James Dean and Marlon Brando.

Guralnick must have read everything ever written about Elvis, listened to every interview or press conference Elvis ever gave, listened to every recording or snippet of a recording he ever made, and spoken with every possible person still living who knew Elvis Presley even a little bit. The book is that authoritative and in depth on both the personal and the musical Elvis. It's a brilliant biography, presenting a wealth of research in a totally readable way. The book is a page turner, except for the moments when you want to put it down to Google Dewey Phillips (famed Memphis DJ who first played Elvis's tunes) or The Statesmen (one of the gospel quartets that greatly influenced Elvis's sound), or look at the famous, breathtakingly intimate photos of Elvis on the cusp of massive fame, taken by Alfred Wertheimer in 1956.

The book ends in 1958, the year Elvis's music and movie career was put on hold by his induction into the Army. It's also the year his beloved mother Gladys died. The unselfish love and devotion she had always shown him were suddenly gone, at the very time when the rest of his life was going dizzyingly, ridiculously nuts, and it tore him up. Without her as his moral compass, he was never the same again.

Guralnick continues Presley's life story in the second volume of his biography, Careless Love: The Unmaking of Elvis Presley. That book delves into the darker side of his life -- the bad choices, the drugs, the women, the entourage of sycophants with their hands out, the ego run amok. Last Train to Memphis focuses on Elvis's rise, however, and it's a remarkable rags-to-riches story about an endearing and talented young man you can't help but empathize with and root for. It made me look at and appreciate Elvis in a whole new way, and wish his story could have had a happier ending.