Mark Twain by Ron Chernow review – the story of America’s first literary celebrity, from the author of Hamilton

In his lifetime, Mark Twain was the greatest literary celebrity the world had ever known. He went on to take his work in progress, Huckleberry Finn, round more than 100 American towns and cities, earning handsomely. His experiences would form the basis for his wonderfully readable Life on the Mississippi and his masterpiece, Huckleberry Finn. Chernow makes out of all this an admirably animated, readable account of one of the modern world’s first celebrities. Somewhere deep inside it, almost hidden, glows the energy and humour of Twain’s very American prose.