English

Born in Birmingham. Called ‘English’ in Jamaica. Still fighting to belong.

Birmingham, 1975. Twelve-year-old Sam Scott lives for snowball fights, comics and winding up his sisters: Eileen, who eats like a harbour shark, and Lauren, who has just arrived from Jamaica with a temper and a saying for everything. His dad Scotty is the life of every party. His mom Madge is the one person nobody crosses.

When dad decides it is time to take the family home to Jamaica, Sam’s world turns to sunshine. There are sound system clashes, crab hunts by moonlight and an island that wraps itself around his heart. They call him ‘English’, and for the first time Sam feels he belongs.

But Jamaica in the 1970s is also a place of gangsters, politics and greed and when tragedy strikes, the Scotts lose almost everything. Back in a cold, grey England, Sam faces a new school, open racism and a system that has already decided who he is.

Told in Sam’s unforgettable voice, laugh-out-loud funny one moment and heartbreaking the next, and rich with Jamaican patois, English is a powerful coming-of-age story about family, identity and growing up Black in 1970s Britain.

Perfect for readers of Andrea Levy’s Small Island, Benjamin Zephaniah and Alex Wheatle.