Inspiring memoir about tenacity and ambition in ad man’s ascent to success

All he ever wanted was to be an ad man. Whoever would have imagined that he would get his first inkling of that career path hiding under the family’s dining room table in suburban London while avoiding the Nazi air raids during World War II?

Beneath that sturdy table, supplied with books, magazines, pads, pencils, lemonade and biscuits, young Anthony Eglin started drawing and visualizing, developing skills at an early age that would lead to a decorated lifetime career in advertising, marketing and design.

And that was how it started for Eglin, as documented with extraordinary passion and detail in his new memoir, "All I Ever Wanted to Be Was an Ad Man."

Whether it was really all Anthony ever wanted or not, it was hardly all he ever got. His curiosity, drive, ambition and lust for life spread to many other fascinating vocations: rock band manager, filmmaker, bike racer, antiques collector/dealer, New Orleans Jazz clarinetist, accomplished gardener, wholesale bakery owner, and an award-winning author of six mystery books.

It’s all here in this story filled with touching anecdotes and the people who influenced him — from the climb to the top of his profession back to his first job in advertising at a small commercial art studio in London, reminiscent of an atmosphere you’d find in a Dickens novel. There, he was tasked with designing hundreds of postage-stamped ads for newspaper travel sections.

“I soon became adept at the challenge,” he writes, “which was abundantly obvious but not so easy to achieve: to make your ad stand out from the clutter of competition.”

Eglin tracks his career with great precision, taking readers through every interview, interaction, strategy and decision. The book is filled with entertaining and...