He's a charmer, all right, this extraordinary man who was born with such deformed legs that at age 20 he made the decision to have them amputated.
He went on to become a multiple gold medal winner at the Paralympic Games (18, and 14 world records),was the first disabled person to be admitted to the UK National College of Physical Education, later became a medical doctor - but is most famous as one of The Three Irish Tenors.
His good humour and generosity of spirit rings through the pages of his memoir like a tenor letting rip at Madison Square Gardens - and yes, he's done that, too.
"Had I not had the cross to bear that I did, and had I not made my own sort of pilgrimage in bearing it, who can say whether I'd ever have been rewarded with all I've been given?" he asks.
And later: "If I couldn't change the scene, I could change the way I acted in it."
This very readable book is released just in time for the New Zealand tour by The Three Irish Tenors, who will be in Auckland on April 5 and 6, at the Bruce Mason Centre.
