Steady as he goes A biography of the Labour leader mirrors its unflashy subject, but offers intriguing clues as to what motivates him

Keir Starmer can be a hard man to read.

- Gaby Hinsliff

The backstory we will hear endlessly in the run-up to the election - that his father was a rather emotionally distant toolmaker, his mother a nurse who suffered with a painful form of arthritis, and that they raised four children on a tight budget in a pebble-dashed semi-explains him to some extent. But he tells it with a slight stiffness that leaves many wondering if there isn't something more. A genuinely revealing account of the rather private man on course to lead the country feels badly overdue.