Mother's Boy: A Writer's Beginnings

In his memoir, Mother's Boy, Howard Jacobson explores his life from childhood to his first marriage and the birth of his son, including his ventures in London, Wolverhampton, Boscastle, and Melbourne. The book is filled with bittersweet memories of his parents and friends and is a hilarious and tender exploration of Jacobson's path to becoming a writer.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 288 pages
Publication date: 16 March 2023
Publisher: Vintage Publishing

One of the all-time great memoirs, the Daily Telegraph has praised it as "wonderful...candid, shrewd, and moving." William Boyd has described it as "laugh-out-loud glorious and uproarious," while Simon Schama has called it "Howard Jacobson's funny, revealing, and tender memoir of his path to becoming a writer."

Howard Jacobson was forty when his first novel was published. In Mother's Boy, he traces the life that brought him there. Born into a working-class Jewish family in the 1940s in Manchester, he did not lack encouragement or subject matter. Jacobson takes us from childhood and studying at Cambridge, through landing in Sydney as a maverick young professor, and on to his first marriage and the birth of his son. Later, he begins new and often surprising ventures in places as disparate as London, Wolverhampton, Boscastle, and Melbourne.

Infused with bittersweet memories of Jacobson's parents and friends, this is the story of a writer's beginnings, and of learning to understand who you are before you can become the writer you were meant to be.

Hilariously brilliant, David Baddiel has praised Howard Jacobson for brilliantly transforming calamity into rip-roaring comedy. Craig Brown, Mail on Sunday, has also praised Jacobson's work, calling it "hilariously brilliant."

Weight: 230g
Dimension: 128 x 197 x 24 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781529115673