Celebrating Fifty Years of Picador Books

You think adoption is a story which has an end. But the point about it is that it has no end. It keeps changing its ending.

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, Kay discovers that inheritance is about much more than genes: that we are shaped by songs as much as by cells, and that what triumphs, ultimately, is love.

Taking the reader from Glasgow to Lagos and beyond, Red Dust Road is a heart-stopping story of parents and siblings, friends and strangers, belonging and beliefs, biology and destiny.

'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

Part of the Picador Collection, a series showcasing the best of modern literature.

'What makes us who we are? My adoption is a story that has happened to me. I couldn't make it up.'

About the Author
Jackie Kay was born in Edinburgh. She is the third modern Makar, the Scottish poet laureate. A poet, novelist and writer of short stories, she has enjoyed great acclaim for her work for both adults and children. Her first novel Trumpet won the Authors' Club First Novel Award and the Guardian Fiction Prize. She is also the author of three collections of stories with Picador, Why Don't You Stop Talking, Wish I Was Here, and Reality, Reality; two poetry collections, Fiere and Bantam; and her memoir, Red Dust Road. She is Professor of Creative Writing at Newcastle University, and lives in Manchester, where she is currently Chancellor of the University of Salford.

Reviews
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 *


Awards
Winner of Scottish Book Awards Book of the Year 2011 (UK). Short-listed for Scottish Book Awards Non-fiction Award 2011 (UK) and National Book Awards Biography of the Year 2011 (UK).



Book Information
ISBN 9781529077230
Author Jackie Kay
Format Paperback
Page Count 320
Imprint Picador
Publisher Pan Macmillan
Weight(grams) 218g
Dimensions(mm) 197mm * 130mm * 21mm