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Red Dust Road
'Like the best memoirs, this one is written with novelistic and poetic flair. Red Dust Road is a fantastic, probing and heart-warming read' - "Independent". From the moment when, as a little girl, she realizes that her skin is a different colour from that of her beloved mum and dad, to the tracing and finding of her birth parents, her Highland mother and Nigerian father, Jackie Kay's journey in "Red Dust Road" is one of unexpected twists, turns and deep emotions. In a book remarkable for its warmth and candour, she discovers that inheritance is about much more than that we are shaped by songs as much as by cells, and that what triumphs, ultimately, is love. 'A clear-eyed, witty and unsentimental account of the push and pull between nature and nurture. Happiness shines through' - "Sunday Times". 'Wonderful, humane ...This is a book with resolution, determination and honesty' - "Scotland on Sunday". 'It is Kay's abundant wit that makes Red Dust Road such a moving, spirited work. This is a terrifically easy, evocative, and often amusing read ...A remarkable, soul-searching journey' - "Sunday Herald".
304 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2010
105 people are currently reading
2495 people want to read
About the author
Jackie Kay
106 books438 followersBorn in Glasgow in 1961 to a Scottish mother and a Nigerian father, Kay was adopted by a white couple, Helen and John Kay, as a baby. Brought up in Bishopbriggs, a Glasgow suburb, she has an older adopted brother, Maxwell as well as siblings by her adoptive parents.
Kay's adoptive father worked full-time for the Communist Party and stood for election as a Member of Parliament, and her adoptive mother was the secretary of the Scottish Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND).
Initially harbouring ambitions to be an actress, she decided to concentrate on writing after encouragement by Alasdair Gray. She studied English at the University of Stirling and her first book of poetry, the partially autobiographical The Adoption Papers, was published in 1991, and won the Saltire Society Scottish First Book Award. Her other awards include the 1994 Somerset Maugham Award for Other Lovers, and the Guardian Fiction Prize for Trumpet, based on the life of American jazz musician Billy Tipton, born Dorothy Tipton, who lived as a man for the last fifty years of her life.
Kay writes extensively stage, screen, and for children. In 2010 she published Red Dust Road, an account of her search for her birth parents, a white Scottish woman, and a Nigerian man. Her birth parents met when her father was a student at Aberdeen University and her mother was a nurse. Her drama The Lamplighter is an exploration of the Atlantic slave trade. It was broadcast on BBC Radio 3 in March 2007 and published in poem form in 2008.
Jackie Kay became a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) on 17 June 2006. She is currently Professor of Creative Writing at Newcastle University. Kay lives in Manchester.
Jackie Kay was born and brought up in Scotland. THE ADOPTION PAPERS (Bloodaxe, 1991) won the Forward Prize, a Saltire prize and a Scottish Arts Council Prize. DARLING was a poetry book society choice. FIERE, her most recent collection of poems was shortlisted for the COSTA award. Her novel TRUMPET won the Guardian Fiction Award and was shortlisted for the IMPAC award. RED DUST ROAD, (Picador) won the Scottish Book of the Year Award, was shortlisted for the JR ACKERLEY prize and the LONDON BOOK AWARD. She was awarded an MBE in 2006, and made a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 2002. Her book of stories WISH I WAS HERE won the Decibel British Book Award.
She also writes for children and her book RED CHERRY RED (Bloomsbury) won the CLYPE award. She has written extensively for stage and television. Her play MANCHESTER LINES produced by Manchester Library Theatre was on this year in Manchester. Her new book of short stories REALITY, REALITY was recently published by Picador. She is Professor of Creative Writing at Newcastle University.
Kay's adoptive father worked full-time for the Communist Party and stood for election as a Member of Parliament, and her adoptive mother was the secretary of the Scottish Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND).
Initially harbouring ambitions to be an actress, she decided to concentrate on writing after encouragement by Alasdair Gray. She studied English at the University of Stirling and her first book of poetry, the partially autobiographical The Adoption Papers, was published in 1991, and won the Saltire Society Scottish First Book Award. Her other awards include the 1994 Somerset Maugham Award for Other Lovers, and the Guardian Fiction Prize for Trumpet, based on the life of American jazz musician Billy Tipton, born Dorothy Tipton, who lived as a man for the last fifty years of her life.
Kay writes extensively stage, screen, and for children. In 2010 she published Red Dust Road, an account of her search for her birth parents, a white Scottish woman, and a Nigerian man. Her birth parents met when her father was a student at Aberdeen University and her mother was a nurse. Her drama The Lamplighter is an exploration of the Atlantic slave trade. It was broadcast on BBC Radio 3 in March 2007 and published in poem form in 2008.
Jackie Kay became a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) on 17 June 2006. She is currently Professor of Creative Writing at Newcastle University. Kay lives in Manchester.
Jackie Kay was born and brought up in Scotland. THE ADOPTION PAPERS (Bloodaxe, 1991) won the Forward Prize, a Saltire prize and a Scottish Arts Council Prize. DARLING was a poetry book society choice. FIERE, her most recent collection of poems was shortlisted for the COSTA award. Her novel TRUMPET won the Guardian Fiction Award and was shortlisted for the IMPAC award. RED DUST ROAD, (Picador) won the Scottish Book of the Year Award, was shortlisted for the JR ACKERLEY prize and the LONDON BOOK AWARD. She was awarded an MBE in 2006, and made a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 2002. Her book of stories WISH I WAS HERE won the Decibel British Book Award.
She also writes for children and her book RED CHERRY RED (Bloomsbury) won the CLYPE award. She has written extensively for stage and television. Her play MANCHESTER LINES produced by Manchester Library Theatre was on this year in Manchester. Her new book of short stories REALITY, REALITY was recently published by Picador. She is Professor of Creative Writing at Newcastle University.
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June 22, 2018
Jackie Kay is a novelist and poet and recipient of an MBE from the Queen. Her birth mother was from the Scottish Highlands and her birth father was a Nigerian studying in Aberdeen when they met. Their baby was put up for adoption and brought up by wonderful parents, who adopted another child, a boy who was perceived as being biracial, though his racial background was not known. Her parents were socialists (members of the Communist Party), and Jackie and her brother were brought up surrounded by activists and union members, and not in any religion.
Starting in childhood and through her adult life Jackie experienced racism. Black people weren't common in 1960's Scotland, particularly Scottish people who were Black. While children were often the perpetrators, she was shocked when men in business suits, and elderly men in parks, revealed racist attitudes.
Jackie is also a lesbian. She mentions this and describes experiences meeting other black lesbians, who were rare in Scotland. In her autobiography, she doesn't explore the intersectionality of her life, but she wrote this several years before the term was everywhere.
A lot of the book tells the story of Jackie's searches for her birth parents. She has the help of her parents in her searches. For me, the most interesting parts of the book describes her trips to Nigeria and what happens in her search to find and get to know her family. She discovers she has a great deal of Ibo in her. Despite the widespread corruption in Nigeria, and the failing to non-existing infrastructure. Jackie comes to love the country, adopting what seems to be a Nigerian view of life.
This was a 4.5 read for me. In the beginning it was a bit slow, but soon picks up. Her search for her birth parents may be of interest to adopted children and adopting parents. It is a great story in that respect.
Starting in childhood and through her adult life Jackie experienced racism. Black people weren't common in 1960's Scotland, particularly Scottish people who were Black. While children were often the perpetrators, she was shocked when men in business suits, and elderly men in parks, revealed racist attitudes.
Jackie is also a lesbian. She mentions this and describes experiences meeting other black lesbians, who were rare in Scotland. In her autobiography, she doesn't explore the intersectionality of her life, but she wrote this several years before the term was everywhere.
A lot of the book tells the story of Jackie's searches for her birth parents. She has the help of her parents in her searches. For me, the most interesting parts of the book describes her trips to Nigeria and what happens in her search to find and get to know her family. She discovers she has a great deal of Ibo in her. Despite the widespread corruption in Nigeria, and the failing to non-existing infrastructure. Jackie comes to love the country, adopting what seems to be a Nigerian view of life.
This was a 4.5 read for me. In the beginning it was a bit slow, but soon picks up. Her search for her birth parents may be of interest to adopted children and adopting parents. It is a great story in that respect.
October 3, 2025
Outstanding, brilliant, what a wonderful book and beautifully articulated story. A favourite for 2012, a hidden treasure absolutely.
I discovered Red Dust Road after reading a feature about Jackie Kay in the Guardian’s A Life in Writing series coinciding with the release of her short story collection Reality Reality. Upon reading the interview I learned that she had also recently published a memoir focusing on the story of her adoption by a Scottish couple and her subsequent attempt to find her Scottish birth mother and Nigerian birth father.
While her brother Maxie said he couldn’t remember not knowing he was adopted, for Jackie, the realisation was one she remembered clearly after watching a cowboy and Indian film and feeling sad because the Indians had lost again and she wanted them to win. After observing that the Indians had her colouring which was not the same as her mother, she asked why. The revelation that followed came as a shock. She cried and worried that ‘not real’ meant her mother was somehow going to disappear or dissolve. Fortunately, she had been gifted with a loving and sensitive adoptive mother, an honest, straightforward and intelligent woman, who clearly loved both her children unconditionally, as Jackie Kay displays in her warm, appreciative depiction of the characters involved in this remarkable and exhilarating story.
In no rush to piece together the puzzle, but knowing that she would, Jackie does a little investigative work and visits Nairn, where her birth mother grew up, Milton Keynes where she lived and Aberdeen where her father was at university. Finally she travels to Nigeria, the foreign land of her ancestors that she had had no connection to in her daily life, but dreamed of and imagined. A kind of homecoming awaits her when she visits the ancestral village of her father.
Recounting her visit to the village and in particular meeting one of the family members, left pools of liquids in my newly prescribed reading glasses, tears of joy and recognition as acknowledgement is realised. I don’t want to say too much, because there is too much good in reading this for the first time and not knowing what will occur, but this is a wonderful story, narrated without sentimentality, putting the reader right in her shoes, almost experiencing it first-hand.
Like so many adoption stories, as depicted so well in Mike Leigh’s ‘Secrets and Lies’, there remains much mystery and secrecy around so many of these stories. For those who have buried that episode in their lives somewhere deep, there is a reluctance to risk the turbulence they perceive it may cause, and even when acknowledged by the natural parent, adoptees in many instances have continued to be kept secret from the rest of the family. This can be one of the greatest risks of pursuing genetic ties, the risk of continued shaming and rejection as an adult with full consciousness, unlike that of a baby; although research suggests that a baby does indeed have awareness of the separation, that it permanently affects their nervous system and affects relationships.
There are so many extracts I could share and talk about from Red Dust Road, the reaction of her own son, the discovery of names, the reading through old archives, visiting buildings from another past, the importance of the imagination and the importance of a true friend, but I would prefer that you read the book and enjoy your own journey and reactions to this wonderfully humane and important story that we are privileged to share.
I discovered Red Dust Road after reading a feature about Jackie Kay in the Guardian’s A Life in Writing series coinciding with the release of her short story collection Reality Reality. Upon reading the interview I learned that she had also recently published a memoir focusing on the story of her adoption by a Scottish couple and her subsequent attempt to find her Scottish birth mother and Nigerian birth father.
‘Betrothed’, she told me ‘your father met your mother in the Highlands of Scotland and they fell in love. He was from Nigeria – look, here it is in the atlas – and she was from the Highlands – look, here’s where she was from, Nairn. They were madly in love and they made you, but he was betrothed and had to return to Nigeria to marry a woman he maybe had never met. They do that there, you know. Hard, Jackie, must have been hard’.
While her brother Maxie said he couldn’t remember not knowing he was adopted, for Jackie, the realisation was one she remembered clearly after watching a cowboy and Indian film and feeling sad because the Indians had lost again and she wanted them to win. After observing that the Indians had her colouring which was not the same as her mother, she asked why. The revelation that followed came as a shock. She cried and worried that ‘not real’ meant her mother was somehow going to disappear or dissolve. Fortunately, she had been gifted with a loving and sensitive adoptive mother, an honest, straightforward and intelligent woman, who clearly loved both her children unconditionally, as Jackie Kay displays in her warm, appreciative depiction of the characters involved in this remarkable and exhilarating story.
In no rush to piece together the puzzle, but knowing that she would, Jackie does a little investigative work and visits Nairn, where her birth mother grew up, Milton Keynes where she lived and Aberdeen where her father was at university. Finally she travels to Nigeria, the foreign land of her ancestors that she had had no connection to in her daily life, but dreamed of and imagined. A kind of homecoming awaits her when she visits the ancestral village of her father.
Recounting her visit to the village and in particular meeting one of the family members, left pools of liquids in my newly prescribed reading glasses, tears of joy and recognition as acknowledgement is realised. I don’t want to say too much, because there is too much good in reading this for the first time and not knowing what will occur, but this is a wonderful story, narrated without sentimentality, putting the reader right in her shoes, almost experiencing it first-hand.
Like so many adoption stories, as depicted so well in Mike Leigh’s ‘Secrets and Lies’, there remains much mystery and secrecy around so many of these stories. For those who have buried that episode in their lives somewhere deep, there is a reluctance to risk the turbulence they perceive it may cause, and even when acknowledged by the natural parent, adoptees in many instances have continued to be kept secret from the rest of the family. This can be one of the greatest risks of pursuing genetic ties, the risk of continued shaming and rejection as an adult with full consciousness, unlike that of a baby; although research suggests that a baby does indeed have awareness of the separation, that it permanently affects their nervous system and affects relationships.
Many doctors and psychologists now understand that bonding doesn’t begin at birth, but is a continuum of physiological, psychological, and spiritual events which begin in utero and continue throughout the postnatal bonding period. When this natural evolution is interrupted by a postnatal separation from the biological mother, the resultant experience of abandonment and loss is indelibly imprinted upon the unconscious minds of these children, causing that which I call the “primal wound”.Nancy Verrier, The Primal Wound: Understanding The Adopted Child
There are so many extracts I could share and talk about from Red Dust Road, the reaction of her own son, the discovery of names, the reading through old archives, visiting buildings from another past, the importance of the imagination and the importance of a true friend, but I would prefer that you read the book and enjoy your own journey and reactions to this wonderfully humane and important story that we are privileged to share.
March 8, 2019
“The land of adoption is fertile ground for the secret; it blooms and blossoms and flourishes; everywhere you dig, there’s a fresh gnarled root.”
Jackie Kay was born out of the brief relationship between a Nigerian student and a Scottish nurse in Aberdeen in the early 1960s. Adopted by a wonderful Scottish couple who were Communist Party members and never thought of race as an issue, she became one of Britain’s best-known poets. This memoir of her search for her birth parents opens with a wonderful sequence in which her 73-year-old father, a religious zealot, tries to convert her in the Abuja Hilton. (What irony that this man who wished she’d never been born – since she was a symbol of his sin – would insist she must be born again!) She’d met her birth mother, Elizabeth, some years ago – also in a Hilton hotel, in Milton Keynes. It’s these kinds of ironies, doublings, contrasts and coincidences that really made this memoir stand out for me.
Over the years Kay’s imperfect relationships with her birth parents continued, though haltingly. She met with Elizabeth several times, though her mother’s advancing dementia made things more difficult – there’s a great scene in which they set off to find her church, where they’re meant to have a soup lunch, but Elizabeth has no idea where it is and has to keep stopping to ask strangers. Kay brings quiet wit to such moments, seeing absurdity and humor rather than dwelling on the sadness. Jonathan was less willing to let his daughter into his life, though. She asked to see him when she returned to Nigeria in 2009 for a program run by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, but he told her he wished her well but wanted her to move on with her life. Instead, she went on an mishap-plagued road trip in search of her ancestral village and met up briefly with her eldest half-brother, Sidney. This stage of her quest is set up as a joyful finale and makes for a gripping final third to the book.
Kay writes with real warmth and a quiet wit. The recreated dialogue, at least with her adoptive parents, must be based on recorded interviews – it’s so authentic, with the dialect successfully but not cartoonishly rendered. Red Dust Road is also a sensitive treatment of belonging and identity. The urge to find one’s origins is, of course, common in many adopted people, but there was another dimension here. As a mixed-race woman, Kay felt like she was too black for Scotland but not black enough in Nigeria. There was always this question of whether she could fit in, especially as she started making her own family as a lesbian woman (Carol Ann Duffy was her partner for 15 years).
The book’s nonlinear structure can be offputting at times; it’s unclear what all the brief sections inhabiting her mind at earlier points in her life have to add to the whole. There is one chapter, reliving family holidays with her adoptive parents, that feels particularly rambly and unnecessary. If you think of the memoir as being like a family photo album, though, such snapshots help to fill in the background.
In my book club we talked a lot about the people we know who are adopted or have adopted, and how these various stories have turned out. Kay writes that there are two camps among the adopted: those who are compelled to find the truth about their birth parents, and those who aren’t. Her older brother, Maxwell, also adopted, was in the latter group – perhaps this explains why he has such a noticeably small role in the memoir. We agreed that, as long as we had the support of our adoptive parents, in Kay’s place we would also have looked for our birth parents.
Jackie Kay was born out of the brief relationship between a Nigerian student and a Scottish nurse in Aberdeen in the early 1960s. Adopted by a wonderful Scottish couple who were Communist Party members and never thought of race as an issue, she became one of Britain’s best-known poets. This memoir of her search for her birth parents opens with a wonderful sequence in which her 73-year-old father, a religious zealot, tries to convert her in the Abuja Hilton. (What irony that this man who wished she’d never been born – since she was a symbol of his sin – would insist she must be born again!) She’d met her birth mother, Elizabeth, some years ago – also in a Hilton hotel, in Milton Keynes. It’s these kinds of ironies, doublings, contrasts and coincidences that really made this memoir stand out for me.
Over the years Kay’s imperfect relationships with her birth parents continued, though haltingly. She met with Elizabeth several times, though her mother’s advancing dementia made things more difficult – there’s a great scene in which they set off to find her church, where they’re meant to have a soup lunch, but Elizabeth has no idea where it is and has to keep stopping to ask strangers. Kay brings quiet wit to such moments, seeing absurdity and humor rather than dwelling on the sadness. Jonathan was less willing to let his daughter into his life, though. She asked to see him when she returned to Nigeria in 2009 for a program run by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, but he told her he wished her well but wanted her to move on with her life. Instead, she went on an mishap-plagued road trip in search of her ancestral village and met up briefly with her eldest half-brother, Sidney. This stage of her quest is set up as a joyful finale and makes for a gripping final third to the book.
Kay writes with real warmth and a quiet wit. The recreated dialogue, at least with her adoptive parents, must be based on recorded interviews – it’s so authentic, with the dialect successfully but not cartoonishly rendered. Red Dust Road is also a sensitive treatment of belonging and identity. The urge to find one’s origins is, of course, common in many adopted people, but there was another dimension here. As a mixed-race woman, Kay felt like she was too black for Scotland but not black enough in Nigeria. There was always this question of whether she could fit in, especially as she started making her own family as a lesbian woman (Carol Ann Duffy was her partner for 15 years).
The book’s nonlinear structure can be offputting at times; it’s unclear what all the brief sections inhabiting her mind at earlier points in her life have to add to the whole. There is one chapter, reliving family holidays with her adoptive parents, that feels particularly rambly and unnecessary. If you think of the memoir as being like a family photo album, though, such snapshots help to fill in the background.
In my book club we talked a lot about the people we know who are adopted or have adopted, and how these various stories have turned out. Kay writes that there are two camps among the adopted: those who are compelled to find the truth about their birth parents, and those who aren’t. Her older brother, Maxwell, also adopted, was in the latter group – perhaps this explains why he has such a noticeably small role in the memoir. We agreed that, as long as we had the support of our adoptive parents, in Kay’s place we would also have looked for our birth parents.
January 1, 2018
good book it changed one story to the next the character is strong in this book,
May 22, 2020
Jackie Kay is a marvel. This is the second book of hers that I've read after the wonderful Trumpet, and the second book of hers that I've rated five stars. She's simply such a masterful writer, with so much control over her language, her structure, her characters, her use of voice... She balances humour with awkwardness, happiness with sadness, bathos with pathos, and everything else in-between. She's so astonishingly good, and I would say underrated, given the relatively small number of reviews of her books on this website. Everyone, get on Jackie Kay if you haven't already. You're missing out on so much beautiful writing.
Red Dust Road is Kay's memoir about adoption, growing up mixed-race in 1960s Scotland, and connecting with her birth parents as an adult. If you're looking at the word 'adoption' and thinking that you already know exactly how this is going to go, then think again. This is not your typical adoption narrative. It's much less romantic than the happiest of adoption stories are, and much less angry than many of the most troubled. It's also not really Kay's quest to find herself or 'complete' her identity, although there are aspects of self-discovery to the narrative. One of the major things that comes across throughout Red Dust Road is that Jackie Kay is already quite happy with the person she is - a mother, a Black Scottish poet, a lesbian, and the daughter of two white Scottish socialists. The only real issue that she really presents within her childhood is racism, and that obviously comes from outside her family. Generally, she seems very content with her lot, and her decision to contact her birth parents feels more the result of curiosity and mere possibility than any desire for completeness. As a result, this is an absolutely lovely book to read about adoption for the most part because it testifies to the powerful love between parents and their adopted children. Large swathes of this book are just so heartwarming and nice, and Kay's parents come across as genuinely great people that anyone would be delighted to know. It's worth reading for that warmness alone.
The sections with Kay's birth parents are less warm and a lot more bizarre, but no less kind. It turns out that, after their daughter was born and subsequently adopted, both parents turned to extreme forms of religion, and Kay witnesses the full force of this when she meets her father in particular. Despite the pervasive sense of anti-climax across several awkward meetings (or failed attempts to meet), during which some VERY strange things are said and asked, Kay's affection for her birth parents and her desire to connect with them is still clear. She emphasises the best moments of her meetings with them, as though to cling onto them, and treats the worst moments with an ironic, mischievous, and sometimes disbelieving humour rather than with bitterness or regret. The parents - both sets of them - feel like real, complex human beings rather than stereotypes, and as a result every scene which contains (or deliberately elides) them feels genuinely moving. Though this book sometimes feels too good to be true in terms of its dialogue and incredible symbolism, it's the emotion that runs through it that gives it its sense of realness. Life is sometimes stranger than fiction, and no amount of mythologising can prepare you for the truth, as Jackie Kay knows and accepts. Sometimes, you've just got to take what you've got and make the best of it, and this book showcases Kay and her families doing precisely that, with varying levels of success.
I should also mention the later sections set in Africa, which is where I felt that the real self-discovery kicked in. To me, the most meaningful tracing of roots within the story - and, consequently, in Kay's life - did not lead to the birth parent, but instead to Nigeria, where Kay was able to embrace the history and culture of her ancestors and, in doing so, embrace her Blackness. The journey through Nigeria that occupies many of the later chapters is so beautifully written, and I felt as though a really obvious transformation was taking place in Kay's conception of herself as she was travelling. In a way, it's the Nigeria chapters which really give you a sense of how at peace she is with her identity, because, if anything completes her, it's the experience of visiting this place that played such a vital role in her past. Also, because the Nigeria section concludes the book, it brings a really nice sense of conclusion to the whole story. Kay is such a great storyteller. She communicates the meanings of events so clearly. Whereas some memoirs just feel like a highlights reel of a life, this one has genuine continuity and so every aspect of the story that Kay chooses to tell feels significant. In that respect, it feels a little like a novel, but that's no bad thing because the more novelistic aspects of this book make the true events being represented feel vivid and alive. I don't think I've ever read a better structured or more compelling piece of life writing before. Honestly, it's just gorgeous on every level.
I was really, really looking forward to reading Red Dust Road when I saw it on my reading list this semester, and yet it still managed to surpass every expectation that I had. This book has all the flair and creativity and achingly beautiful prose of Trumpet (which is so underrated! It may be a sad book but it's a STUNNING book! Please read it!) mixed with an honesty and a charm that honestly just makes you fall in love with Jackie Kay. My big feeling upon finishing this was that I wanted to read more from her, about her, vaguely to do with her... anything. I just think she's amazing. In fact, I'm tempted to tweet her telling her just how amazing she is as soon as I'm finished with this review. That's how obsessed I have suddenly become. Needless to say, I will be reading more from Kay in future. I've yet to try any of the poetry that she's so renowned for, so, having loved this non-fiction take on adoption so much, I think I'll give The Adoption Papers a try next, but we'll see. To summarise, an incredibly affecting, involving, and intimate memoir that looks at the complicated and messy nature of family with a mixture of warmth and wit. I cannot recommend it highly enough.
Red Dust Road is Kay's memoir about adoption, growing up mixed-race in 1960s Scotland, and connecting with her birth parents as an adult. If you're looking at the word 'adoption' and thinking that you already know exactly how this is going to go, then think again. This is not your typical adoption narrative. It's much less romantic than the happiest of adoption stories are, and much less angry than many of the most troubled. It's also not really Kay's quest to find herself or 'complete' her identity, although there are aspects of self-discovery to the narrative. One of the major things that comes across throughout Red Dust Road is that Jackie Kay is already quite happy with the person she is - a mother, a Black Scottish poet, a lesbian, and the daughter of two white Scottish socialists. The only real issue that she really presents within her childhood is racism, and that obviously comes from outside her family. Generally, she seems very content with her lot, and her decision to contact her birth parents feels more the result of curiosity and mere possibility than any desire for completeness. As a result, this is an absolutely lovely book to read about adoption for the most part because it testifies to the powerful love between parents and their adopted children. Large swathes of this book are just so heartwarming and nice, and Kay's parents come across as genuinely great people that anyone would be delighted to know. It's worth reading for that warmness alone.
The sections with Kay's birth parents are less warm and a lot more bizarre, but no less kind. It turns out that, after their daughter was born and subsequently adopted, both parents turned to extreme forms of religion, and Kay witnesses the full force of this when she meets her father in particular. Despite the pervasive sense of anti-climax across several awkward meetings (or failed attempts to meet), during which some VERY strange things are said and asked, Kay's affection for her birth parents and her desire to connect with them is still clear. She emphasises the best moments of her meetings with them, as though to cling onto them, and treats the worst moments with an ironic, mischievous, and sometimes disbelieving humour rather than with bitterness or regret. The parents - both sets of them - feel like real, complex human beings rather than stereotypes, and as a result every scene which contains (or deliberately elides) them feels genuinely moving. Though this book sometimes feels too good to be true in terms of its dialogue and incredible symbolism, it's the emotion that runs through it that gives it its sense of realness. Life is sometimes stranger than fiction, and no amount of mythologising can prepare you for the truth, as Jackie Kay knows and accepts. Sometimes, you've just got to take what you've got and make the best of it, and this book showcases Kay and her families doing precisely that, with varying levels of success.
I should also mention the later sections set in Africa, which is where I felt that the real self-discovery kicked in. To me, the most meaningful tracing of roots within the story - and, consequently, in Kay's life - did not lead to the birth parent, but instead to Nigeria, where Kay was able to embrace the history and culture of her ancestors and, in doing so, embrace her Blackness. The journey through Nigeria that occupies many of the later chapters is so beautifully written, and I felt as though a really obvious transformation was taking place in Kay's conception of herself as she was travelling. In a way, it's the Nigeria chapters which really give you a sense of how at peace she is with her identity, because, if anything completes her, it's the experience of visiting this place that played such a vital role in her past. Also, because the Nigeria section concludes the book, it brings a really nice sense of conclusion to the whole story. Kay is such a great storyteller. She communicates the meanings of events so clearly. Whereas some memoirs just feel like a highlights reel of a life, this one has genuine continuity and so every aspect of the story that Kay chooses to tell feels significant. In that respect, it feels a little like a novel, but that's no bad thing because the more novelistic aspects of this book make the true events being represented feel vivid and alive. I don't think I've ever read a better structured or more compelling piece of life writing before. Honestly, it's just gorgeous on every level.
I was really, really looking forward to reading Red Dust Road when I saw it on my reading list this semester, and yet it still managed to surpass every expectation that I had. This book has all the flair and creativity and achingly beautiful prose of Trumpet (which is so underrated! It may be a sad book but it's a STUNNING book! Please read it!) mixed with an honesty and a charm that honestly just makes you fall in love with Jackie Kay. My big feeling upon finishing this was that I wanted to read more from her, about her, vaguely to do with her... anything. I just think she's amazing. In fact, I'm tempted to tweet her telling her just how amazing she is as soon as I'm finished with this review. That's how obsessed I have suddenly become. Needless to say, I will be reading more from Kay in future. I've yet to try any of the poetry that she's so renowned for, so, having loved this non-fiction take on adoption so much, I think I'll give The Adoption Papers a try next, but we'll see. To summarise, an incredibly affecting, involving, and intimate memoir that looks at the complicated and messy nature of family with a mixture of warmth and wit. I cannot recommend it highly enough.
December 27, 2024
I always feel like books fall victim to the state I’m currently in; the part of my journey I’m on shapes how I perceive the book and whether I enjoy it. Jackie Kay’s Red Dust Road found me in a particularly vulnerable state. I bought the book in a charity shop in Rainbow Beach, right before embarking on a bus journey to Noosa Heads. Like Jackie, I’m traveling through a country that feels like me but simultaneously has nothing to do with me.
Red Dust Road is for those who long for melancholy, nostalgia, and the experience of finding oneself in both expected and unexpected places. However, aspects of the writing put me off—when my mind slipped, I sometimes lost track of the year, month, or country we were in. Still, it’s a great book, and it offered a great way to live through December.
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March 26, 2016I got this book free at an event for world book night, I'd heard Jackie Kay on radio 4 before and liked her and since bought some of her poetry which I enjoyed. I was pleased when she was appointed makar, and thought I'd give this a go.
There are so many really moving moments, mainly to do with her tracking down her biological family, but i wanted to highlight one thing specifically: the warmth with which she describes her upbringing and her communist parents, the humanitarian values they taught her, the support and encouragement they gave her throughout her life. Also the descriptions of CP socials and the comrades she met at them.
It is in sharp contrast to the communist misery memoirs currently being punted by David aaronovitch and Alexei sayle.
There are so many really moving moments, mainly to do with her tracking down her biological family, but i wanted to highlight one thing specifically: the warmth with which she describes her upbringing and her communist parents, the humanitarian values they taught her, the support and encouragement they gave her throughout her life. Also the descriptions of CP socials and the comrades she met at them.
It is in sharp contrast to the communist misery memoirs currently being punted by David aaronovitch and Alexei sayle.
April 13, 2011
I have never felt as intensely mirrored or seen as I did from reading this book. I'm actually kind of shaking a little. Thank you Jackie.
January 15, 2024
A review at the back of my edition mentions that this is an ‘anti misery memoir’ and that feels like a good description of a book that is full of heart and warmth. Not that Kay had it easy. There is racism (causal and ignorant but also violent), a life changing accident and a search for her birth parents that is not always ideal, but Kay approaches everything with honesty, compassion and humour. It was refreshing as well to see her motivations for searching for her birth parents when she has such a loving relationship with her adoptive parents - when often in literature and memoir such stories are (understandably) skewed towards more dysfunctional relationships. Heart warming, informative and also very enjoyable.
August 30, 2022
Although I really enjoyed reading about Kays life story especially how all her parents were so different, I didn’t particularly like her writing style as there were times I had to figure out who was speaking and who certain characters were and their relationship to Kay and I could only do this by rereading certain paragraphs. Also her story kept flitting backwards and forwards in time between the past and the present and didn’t run throughout the years consecutively.
A rich narrative though.
A rich narrative though.
January 30, 2015
I had not heard of this writer until I was given the audio CD version of this book for Christmas. Jackie Kay is a poet and a professor of Creative Writing at Newcastle University in the UK.
Many people have written about the evil effects of discrimination and this author has encountered more than most. She was born to a white Scottish woman and a black Nigerian father and adopted by a white Scottish couple in the 1960s in Glasgow where most people were hostile to anyone with a darker skin. She is also gay, and while she does not dwell on this aspect of her life, it must surely have meant that she faced more bigoted people who disapproved of her lifestyle. Her accounts of bullying in school are very moving and she was lucky that she had an older brother who defended her.
This memoir is not only about her childhood but the main theme is her appreciation of the her adoptive parents and her search for her birth parents...an emotionally challenging prospect. Jackie meets her birth mother who later re-married and had more children. It is not an entirely satisfactory experience and the mother does not want her family to know that Jackie exists as she still feels shame about being pregnant with little support in 1960s Glasgow.
Her search for her father takes her to Nigeria where she does manage one meeting with him. The father also feels shame about impregnating his girlfriend and abandoning her to return to Africa. After that one meeting he does not want any more contact with her and does not want his children to know she exists. With the help of friends she makes in Nigeria, she makes a rather hair-raising expedition to her Ancestral Villages and the book ends on a very positive note.
I highly recommend the audio edition of this book. It is read by Jackie herself and I found her Glasgow accent, and the parts that she reads in Ebo accent really enhance the experience of reading this book. Caution, once you have started, you will find it hard to put down!
Many people have written about the evil effects of discrimination and this author has encountered more than most. She was born to a white Scottish woman and a black Nigerian father and adopted by a white Scottish couple in the 1960s in Glasgow where most people were hostile to anyone with a darker skin. She is also gay, and while she does not dwell on this aspect of her life, it must surely have meant that she faced more bigoted people who disapproved of her lifestyle. Her accounts of bullying in school are very moving and she was lucky that she had an older brother who defended her.
This memoir is not only about her childhood but the main theme is her appreciation of the her adoptive parents and her search for her birth parents...an emotionally challenging prospect. Jackie meets her birth mother who later re-married and had more children. It is not an entirely satisfactory experience and the mother does not want her family to know that Jackie exists as she still feels shame about being pregnant with little support in 1960s Glasgow.
Her search for her father takes her to Nigeria where she does manage one meeting with him. The father also feels shame about impregnating his girlfriend and abandoning her to return to Africa. After that one meeting he does not want any more contact with her and does not want his children to know she exists. With the help of friends she makes in Nigeria, she makes a rather hair-raising expedition to her Ancestral Villages and the book ends on a very positive note.
I highly recommend the audio edition of this book. It is read by Jackie herself and I found her Glasgow accent, and the parts that she reads in Ebo accent really enhance the experience of reading this book. Caution, once you have started, you will find it hard to put down!
February 14, 2017
Comes across very well that Kaye is looking for a sense of place other than Scotland as she searches for her birth parents. Her journey takes her from Glasgow to Nigeria via Aberdeen An easy and engaging read and you question inheritance or nurture in what we become. How accidents can send us on different paths is explored. I hope a second biography is published to tell us what happens next.
February 26, 2022
A fork in the road of a life lived and a possible past one described in deceptively simple but occasionally lyrically beautiful prose. A humane portrayal of real and adoptive parents and a rounded depiction of the author herself and her experiences.
August 27, 2017
I love this woman 💓
March 25, 2020
This is such a beautiful and wonderful book. I rated it 5 stars but I enjoyed it so much that if I could I would’ve given it 10 stars and that still wouldn’t have been enough.
April 11, 2012
I knew nothing about Jackie Kay before opening this book, so it was a bit of a leap in the dark. She writes poetry, it turns out, and has obviously attracted some attention with it because she has an MBE. But this book is not about her writing, it's about how she was adopted and came to find her natural parents. Not that there's much to say about that - they never really become three dimensional, glimpsed in rather fraught occasional meetings in their old age. But if the central focus of the book is a little hazy, the decorative curlicues around the edges, the snippets of life with her adoptive parents, are what bring the story to vivid life, rich with humour and deep affection.
To be honest, I often wonder with a book of this type just why the author decided to write it. Fiction and poetry I can understand - there's a desire to tell a story, to create something new and original, to say something. But a memoir? Why would an author think these little vignettes from an ordinary life, however well written, would be interesting? Is it catharsis? It's clear that meeting her birth parents was a traumatic experience, on both sides, so maybe Kay felt the need for some kind of release, a kind of blood-letting, or perhaps a way of packaging it all up neatly into something small and manageable like a book, so it can be tidily shelved away. But what exactly do all her friends and relations (long-standing or newly discovered) feel to be written about in this tell-all way - the family's secrets spread out in the open for people like me to maul and comment on and make judgments about.
Maybe the author intended it partly as a celebration of her adoptive parents. Certainly the contrast with her birth parents could hardly be more stark, and makes their own eccentricities (they were active socialists and atheists) seem trivial and positively benign by comparison. It is also clear that, whatever the emotional ups and downs and physial difficulties involved in meeting her birth family, and however great her euphoria when things went well, it was always her adoptive parents who grounded her, and formed the solid bedrock of her life.
This is not a particularly original book, in many ways. There are many other works written by people tracing their roots and finding out surprising things about themselves and their families. There are many other works about the experience of being black or lesbian or adopted. Some of them are far more profound or moving than this one. Kay had, after all, a fairly sheltered upbringing in a loving family. Nevertheless, however lightweight the subject matter, Kay's writing skills shine through, and there's enough humour and charm here to make the book an interesting, if not compelling, read.
To be honest, I often wonder with a book of this type just why the author decided to write it. Fiction and poetry I can understand - there's a desire to tell a story, to create something new and original, to say something. But a memoir? Why would an author think these little vignettes from an ordinary life, however well written, would be interesting? Is it catharsis? It's clear that meeting her birth parents was a traumatic experience, on both sides, so maybe Kay felt the need for some kind of release, a kind of blood-letting, or perhaps a way of packaging it all up neatly into something small and manageable like a book, so it can be tidily shelved away. But what exactly do all her friends and relations (long-standing or newly discovered) feel to be written about in this tell-all way - the family's secrets spread out in the open for people like me to maul and comment on and make judgments about.
Maybe the author intended it partly as a celebration of her adoptive parents. Certainly the contrast with her birth parents could hardly be more stark, and makes their own eccentricities (they were active socialists and atheists) seem trivial and positively benign by comparison. It is also clear that, whatever the emotional ups and downs and physial difficulties involved in meeting her birth family, and however great her euphoria when things went well, it was always her adoptive parents who grounded her, and formed the solid bedrock of her life.
This is not a particularly original book, in many ways. There are many other works written by people tracing their roots and finding out surprising things about themselves and their families. There are many other works about the experience of being black or lesbian or adopted. Some of them are far more profound or moving than this one. Kay had, after all, a fairly sheltered upbringing in a loving family. Nevertheless, however lightweight the subject matter, Kay's writing skills shine through, and there's enough humour and charm here to make the book an interesting, if not compelling, read.
March 6, 2014
blurb - It was the imminent birth of her son that prompted the poet and novelist Jackie Kay to try and trace the parents who had given her up for adoption in the 1960s.
Her own childhood had been a profoundly happy one with open and loving parents . They had always made it clear to her that she and her elder brother, both mixed race, were 'special' because they had been 'chosen'. But Scotland and indeed Britain was not always an easy place to be, particularly in those early years, if your skin colour happened to be several shades darker than everybody else's.
The casual offensiveness of the oft-phrased question "where are you from?" - which looked beyond her obviously Scottish accent and saw only her non-white skin - provoked a defiant assertion: "Here." School lessons about Africa were always an uncomfortable experience as classmates trotted out the dancing, drumming, mud-hut cliches.
Eventually, with the solid support of her family and her partner and friends, Kay decided that she needed to know the story of where she was from, and embarked on the complex emotional and physical journey.
Her Mum was a great storyteller and had often shared imaginings of a tragic romance broken off by an arranged betrothal, a princely heritage and a Sidney Poitier-like figure for a father. The truth, as Kay discovers, never quite matches the fantasies - sometimes it outdoes them. As for the jigsaw puzzle of heritage, family and identity, assembling the pieces doesn't always provide answers.
Read by the author.
Producer/Abridger: Jill Waters
Jackie is a real life private investigator of traditional build - wonderful story.
Her own childhood had been a profoundly happy one with open and loving parents . They had always made it clear to her that she and her elder brother, both mixed race, were 'special' because they had been 'chosen'. But Scotland and indeed Britain was not always an easy place to be, particularly in those early years, if your skin colour happened to be several shades darker than everybody else's.
The casual offensiveness of the oft-phrased question "where are you from?" - which looked beyond her obviously Scottish accent and saw only her non-white skin - provoked a defiant assertion: "Here." School lessons about Africa were always an uncomfortable experience as classmates trotted out the dancing, drumming, mud-hut cliches.
Eventually, with the solid support of her family and her partner and friends, Kay decided that she needed to know the story of where she was from, and embarked on the complex emotional and physical journey.
Her Mum was a great storyteller and had often shared imaginings of a tragic romance broken off by an arranged betrothal, a princely heritage and a Sidney Poitier-like figure for a father. The truth, as Kay discovers, never quite matches the fantasies - sometimes it outdoes them. As for the jigsaw puzzle of heritage, family and identity, assembling the pieces doesn't always provide answers.
Read by the author.
Producer/Abridger: Jill Waters
Jackie is a real life private investigator of traditional build - wonderful story.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
May 29, 2015
From BBC Radio 4 - Book at the Week:
t was the imminent birth of her son that prompted the poet and novelist Jackie Kay to try and trace the parents who had given her up for adoption in the 1960s.
Her own childhood had been a profoundly happy one with open and loving parents . They had always made it clear to her that she and her elder brother, both mixed race, were 'special' because they had been 'chosen'. But Scotland and indeed Britain was not always an easy place to be, particularly in those early years, if your skin colour happened to be several shades darker than everybody else's.
The casual offensiveness of the oft-phrased question "where are you from?" - which looked beyond her obviously Scottish accent and saw only her non-white skin - provoked a defiant assertion: "Here." School lessons about Africa were always an uncomfortable experience as classmates trotted out the dancing, drumming, mud-hut cliches.
Eventually, with the solid support of her family and her partner and friends, Kay decided that she needed to know the story of where she was from, and embarked on the complex emotional and physical journey.
Her Mum was a great storyteller and had often shared imaginings of a tragic romance broken off by an arranged betrothal, a princely heritage and a Sidney Poitier-like figure for a father. The truth, as Kay discovers, never quite matches the fantasies - sometimes it outdoes them. As for the jigsaw puzzle of heritage, family and identity, assembling the pieces doesn't always provide answers.
Read by the author.
Producer/Abridger: Jill Waters.
t was the imminent birth of her son that prompted the poet and novelist Jackie Kay to try and trace the parents who had given her up for adoption in the 1960s.
Her own childhood had been a profoundly happy one with open and loving parents . They had always made it clear to her that she and her elder brother, both mixed race, were 'special' because they had been 'chosen'. But Scotland and indeed Britain was not always an easy place to be, particularly in those early years, if your skin colour happened to be several shades darker than everybody else's.
The casual offensiveness of the oft-phrased question "where are you from?" - which looked beyond her obviously Scottish accent and saw only her non-white skin - provoked a defiant assertion: "Here." School lessons about Africa were always an uncomfortable experience as classmates trotted out the dancing, drumming, mud-hut cliches.
Eventually, with the solid support of her family and her partner and friends, Kay decided that she needed to know the story of where she was from, and embarked on the complex emotional and physical journey.
Her Mum was a great storyteller and had often shared imaginings of a tragic romance broken off by an arranged betrothal, a princely heritage and a Sidney Poitier-like figure for a father. The truth, as Kay discovers, never quite matches the fantasies - sometimes it outdoes them. As for the jigsaw puzzle of heritage, family and identity, assembling the pieces doesn't always provide answers.
Read by the author.
Producer/Abridger: Jill Waters.
March 13, 2014
I think at the moment I'm really into books that take their political commitments for granted, that aren't about trying to persuade you into them or explain them, that don't assume you don't already share those values, where radical politics is the setting, not the jewel. Human stories about and for politicised people.
I came across Jackie Kay in a book of women's poetry -- she'd written a poem about a woman frantically trying to hide all traces of her left-wing political commitments from her home before a social worker visits. I loved the straighforwardness and humour of it. I did a little research and found that Jackie Kay was a black lesbian Scottish poet, adopted and raised by white communists. She'd written this book about tracking down her birth parents. I had to check it out.
It turns out that her birth mother was a white Scottish woman of nervous temperament, pressured to give up the baby she conceived with a Nigerian student who returned home shortly thereafter. Kay's search for some kind of relationship with her birth parents and their families is bittersweet, funny, hopeful, sweet but not saccharine. I sometimes thought she went too easy on her sometimes-clueless adoptive parents, but she obviously loves them, plus they're probably still alive, so I'm not going to make too many criticisms of that. Plus I really liked Jackie herself. The last few chapters made me laugh out loud with delight. Check it out.
I came across Jackie Kay in a book of women's poetry -- she'd written a poem about a woman frantically trying to hide all traces of her left-wing political commitments from her home before a social worker visits. I loved the straighforwardness and humour of it. I did a little research and found that Jackie Kay was a black lesbian Scottish poet, adopted and raised by white communists. She'd written this book about tracking down her birth parents. I had to check it out.
It turns out that her birth mother was a white Scottish woman of nervous temperament, pressured to give up the baby she conceived with a Nigerian student who returned home shortly thereafter. Kay's search for some kind of relationship with her birth parents and their families is bittersweet, funny, hopeful, sweet but not saccharine. I sometimes thought she went too easy on her sometimes-clueless adoptive parents, but she obviously loves them, plus they're probably still alive, so I'm not going to make too many criticisms of that. Plus I really liked Jackie herself. The last few chapters made me laugh out loud with delight. Check it out.
December 26, 2014
Great memoir, beautifully written and giving real insight into Jackie Kay's life, and how she feels about herself. I have already read and enjoyed Trumpet, I think I will try some of her poetry now.
May 9, 2018
This was my first audiobook for a very long time indeed, and it is difficult to judge against other books since the experience is so different. Some parts were very affecting and I found myself laughing out loud and with occasional tears in my eyes. I also really enjoyed some of the poetic imagery.
I can see why some other reviewers found the family anecdotes to be a bit too everyday for them, but I think there is some real value in seeing someone else's everyday, and it is interesting to see Kay reflect on how her life might have been different. For me, the fact that I loved reading about her adoptive parents really helped. I found them extremely endearing, and her reflections on them ageing were really touching. I have heard her speak about them in fact, and the amount of love she has for them is wonderful. It was also interesting to hear her reflections on the racism she has experienced in her lifetime. I have never read the recollections of any other adopted person tracing their blood family, so that was novel for me.
Overall, it was somewhat less than I expected, but still well worth my time.
I can see why some other reviewers found the family anecdotes to be a bit too everyday for them, but I think there is some real value in seeing someone else's everyday, and it is interesting to see Kay reflect on how her life might have been different. For me, the fact that I loved reading about her adoptive parents really helped. I found them extremely endearing, and her reflections on them ageing were really touching. I have heard her speak about them in fact, and the amount of love she has for them is wonderful. It was also interesting to hear her reflections on the racism she has experienced in her lifetime. I have never read the recollections of any other adopted person tracing their blood family, so that was novel for me.
Overall, it was somewhat less than I expected, but still well worth my time.
December 12, 2019
This is a lovely memoir about an adoptee seeking her birth parents. The hitch is that her birth mother is a reclusive, mentally fragile white nurse in Britain and her father is an elusive, difficult tree scientist turned fundamentalist preacher in Nigeria. The road to reconciliation is bumpy indeed.
Fortunately, the author has the eternal love and support of her adopted parents. She never doubts for one minute their devotion to her; they are always there for her.
I really liked this book, not just for the story but also, and perhaps even more so, for the beautiful descriptions of Scotland and Nigeria, the interactions with her family members, the flashbacks to various stages of her life, and the pure joy she is capable of feeling. This is a beautiful book.
Fortunately, the author has the eternal love and support of her adopted parents. She never doubts for one minute their devotion to her; they are always there for her.
I really liked this book, not just for the story but also, and perhaps even more so, for the beautiful descriptions of Scotland and Nigeria, the interactions with her family members, the flashbacks to various stages of her life, and the pure joy she is capable of feeling. This is a beautiful book.
August 7, 2023
A beautiful memoir which narrates Jackie Kay’s experience of being raised by her adoptive family in Glasgow in the ‘60s, her quest to find her birth mother and shortly after setting on the journey down the red dust road to meet her birth father. Sharing herself at her most vulnerable and her intriguing life story in a most authentic Kay grabs you by the hand and takes you on her journey of discovery which is at times heart wrenching and at others laugh out loud funny.
I couldn’t quite believe the nonsensical rambling of her Bible bashing birth dad when they first meet. I felt a little touch of sympathy for her birth mother despite her poor life choices when it came to religion too. I also couldn’t quite understand (perhaps because I’m not adopted and can’t appreciate the range of emotions an adopted child will feel during their lifetime, but at some point I was seriously frustrated by Kay’s desire to have a relationship with her birth father who calls her a “sin” and tells her he’s unable to acknowledge her as his daughter unless she repents her sinful ways and becomes born again. Until almost the end Kay is clutching at the straws to justify her birth father’s behaviour. While his acknowledgment might be the ultimate holy grail, never fulfilled, the last chapter throw up an unexpected surprise for Kay which shows her long journey to finding her identity wasn’t futile after all.
January 12, 2026
4 stars! Really great read by a local author (/hero/icon). Very interesting insight into growing up black in the 60-80s in Glasgow and a really emotionally gripping story of finding and connecting (or not!) to your birth family as an adoptee. Really enjoyed hearing Jackie’s perspective and insight into the complexity of the emotions that came with that, and thorough enjoyed the scattering of beautiful poetic lyricism throughout the book
October 30, 2023
This was great! Can 100% recommend! One of my favourite books I had to read for university.
I also read this one so fast compared to my previous two "reading slump due to stress" weeks. I loved the writing style, and reading Jackie Kay's life story about adoption, growing up in Scotland, finding her birth family, and life in a UK that is more racist than it wants to admit.
I also read this one so fast compared to my previous two "reading slump due to stress" weeks. I loved the writing style, and reading Jackie Kay's life story about adoption, growing up in Scotland, finding her birth family, and life in a UK that is more racist than it wants to admit.
October 19, 2021
such easy prose
June 9, 2024
Second time reading. This time on audio narrated by the author which give added credence to the memoir.
Read
February 18, 2025casual the thing around your neck mention
March 10, 2025
audiobook’ed for uni course, fun narration/author style, genre out of my comfort zone so i struggled a bit
April 16, 2025
A touching and characteristically funny collection of tales from Jackie Kay’s life and childhood. Navigating her Scottish and Nigerian roots and what to do when the roots you find aren’t quite what you imagined.
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