Head Shot
By Victoria Nixon
How does a Vogue model confront a double family suicide and live a normal life?
Publication date: Summer 2019
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Let’s get this out of the way: I’m not a current celebrity, an intrepid explorer or a noted scientist, so why have I written a memoir?
Well when your family die before you’re 24 it takes some clout to keep going. Especially when you’ve been catapulted from a Yorkshire mining town into the strangely glamorous world of holding taut poses under blazing lights, draped in satin couture confections and slippery stoles.
There’s no denying that 1967 was an extraordinary time: spotted in London’s Bond Street by Helmut Newton and photographed for Vogue which led to travelling the world with a paid-for smile, earning a fortune and hanging out with the happening people of those times. But then, in my New York apartment, my brother suddenly took his own life, and my beloved mother died too. My father had taken his life when I was just 13.
I was alone and it was a tough call to fake those smiles whilst hiding in a frozen cave of bewildered bereavement. No councellors to tell me “Sometimes you’re the butterfly, sometimes you’re the windscreen.” I had to make my own rules for survival until I found the sun again.
Each chapter of this book takes place in a city where I worked, capturing far-out times spent with Andy Warhol, the Shah of Iran, Salvador Dali, the Beach Boys and…okay that’s enough name dropping. It’s packed with counterculture shots by the leading photographers I was lucky enough to work with, and features the defiant empowering fashions I fully embraced which replaced the ‘wide-eyed waifs in mini-skirts.’
After my cheek bones ceased to cut it in the glossies, my backbone kicked in and opened up this life to some extreme realities and harsh lessons learnt. A life ripped apart by circumstance was rebuilt with hard work in diverse arenas, and that quiet haven found in hope whilst discovering my true love of life again.
This is a memoir that tackles the sensitive subject of suicide bereavement in a fresh, bold and distinctive way – to inform, help, inspire and possibly save future precious lives. Because nothing – absolutely nothing – matters more than life itself.


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Victoria Nixon
Victoria Nixon is the Co-founder and Managing Director of AirCell Structures Ltd, a British company which designs and manufactures humanitarian aid products used worldwide.
Born and educated in Barnsley, South Yorkshire, she was 18 when discovered by the late Helmut Newton, who photographed her for Vogue. This launched her international modelling career as Vikki Nixon in the late Sixties. She became an award-winning advertising copywriter, television producer, magazine editor and author. In the Nineties, she opened a London deli specialising in healthy fresh food – the first in the UK to ban all plastic packaging.
Her first book, Supermodels' Beauty Secrets, was published in 2002 and nominated 'Best Beauty Book' by the Daily Mail in 2010. Her second book, Supermodels' Diet Secrets, was published in 2004. -
CLOSE-UP
- 10th July 2018 So Close!
Great to report that Head Shot is now 91% funded - a few more pledges and we're there! Thanks so much for all your support. Soon you'll be reading a book that you made happen...I promise it'll be worth the wait!
3rd May 2018 Head Line NEWS!Wow – Head Shot is 70% on its way to being published! On the home stretch now thanks to the fabulous pledgers who’ve so generously supported this book. Please keep spreading the word on Social Media and your personal networks and let’s all raise awareness that lives affected by suicide CAN find happiness again. I know I was there for each chapter of this life:
- Growing up in Yorkshire mining…
15th February 2018 Lift off!The first week's pledges are in and, thanks to my loyal supporters, the Head Shot campaign is already 7% funded! With your help to share and spread the word, readers can discover how two extremes collided whilst I travelled the world as a model and my entire family died. Surviving suicide bereavement is a tall order but pain is a debt that can be paid off by time and lessons learnt. Head Shot is…
These people are helping to fund Head Shot.
Janet Richards
Pierre L'Allier
Christine Asbury
Nikki Livingstone-Rothwell
Neil Huddleston
PAUL STEPHEN LAFFERTY
Mac Macintire
Fiona Thomas
Tom Fletcher
Carlo Navato
Catherine Ward
Linda Severino
Vanessa Edwards
Angelina Kumeri
James Cook
Douglas Bassett
Emma Young
Alex Winter
An anonymous donor
Faith Simpson
Ankit Patel
Harry King
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