SEPTEMBER 2014 - AudioFile
Celebrated actor Alan Cumming is best known for his lilting Scottish accent and his well-trained musical voice. His roles in hit movies, Tony award-winning performance on Broadway in CABARET, and many television roles show how versatile his talent is. Cumming uses all his vocal experience and charm in this searing memoir. His unashamedly honest and emotionally raw remembrance of surviving his abusive father is a must-hear. Intrigue also plays a part in the story as Cumming recounts how he set out to solve a mystery surrounding his grandfather—and found out way more than he bargained for. Delivering stories that are both harrowing and at times hilarious, Cumming reaches through your earphones and doesn’t let go. Make sure you carry a pocket of tissues. R.O. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award, 2015 Audies Winner © AudioFile 2014, Portland, Maine
Publishers Weekly
07/28/2014
Scottish actor Cumming struggles to reconcile with his troubled past in this moving, if oddly structured, memoir. Alternating between three time periods—“Then,” “Now,” and a span of several months in 2010—Cumming recounts his life on a rural Scottish estate under the brutal reign of his abusive father, Alex. Equally violent toward Cumming’s older brother, Tom, Alex was a defining force in Cumming’s life, with the emotional and physical scars of his beatings affecting Cumming long after he left home for drama school at age 17. In a parallel narrative, Cumming recounts his experiences as a participant on Britain’s Who Do You Think You Are?, a television program on which celebrities explore their pasts, often going so far as to get genetic tests. Even as issues closer to home involving Cumming’s ties, or lack thereof, to his father arise (as the book’s title might suggest), Cumming is determined to delve into his family history: and find out what happened to his maternal grandfather, Lieutenant Tommy Darling, who served his country in WWII and ended up suspiciously dead several years later in Malaysia, where he was a member of the police force. While the particulars Cumming learns about Darling are striking and memorable, this really is a case where the journey is more important than the destination. (Oct.)
Neil Gaiman
Equal parts memoir, whodunnit, and manual for living, NOT MY FATHER’S SON is a beautifully written, honest look at the forces of blood and bone that make us what we are, and how we make ourselves. I was completely sucked in.
Harlan Coben
Alan Cumming’s moving memoir NOT MY FATHER’S SON is a beautiful book—sad, funny, haunting, surprising, suspenseful, gut-wrenching, endearing. It will linger inside of you long after you turn the final page.
SEPTEMBER 2014 - AudioFile
Celebrated actor Alan Cumming is best known for his lilting Scottish accent and his well-trained musical voice. His roles in hit movies, Tony award-winning performance on Broadway in CABARET, and many television roles show how versatile his talent is. Cumming uses all his vocal experience and charm in this searing memoir. His unashamedly honest and emotionally raw remembrance of surviving his abusive father is a must-hear. Intrigue also plays a part in the story as Cumming recounts how he set out to solve a mystery surrounding his grandfather—and found out way more than he bargained for. Delivering stories that are both harrowing and at times hilarious, Cumming reaches through your earphones and doesn’t let go. Make sure you carry a pocket of tissues. R.O. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award, 2015 Audies Winner © AudioFile 2014, Portland, Maine
Kirkus Reviews
2014-07-27
The award-winning actor uncovers his family's darkest secret. Instead of writing a showbiz memoir with stories of his eclectic career, Cumming—who has won countless acting awards, including a Tony for his role in Cabaret—anchors his book with his discovery of the truth about his grandfather's premature death (at age 35) and a recognition of the "dual family narrative" of shame and secrecy. He came to understand that both he and his grandfather Tommy Darling suffered combat stress: Darling as a decorated World War II soldier and the author at the hands of his father. Cumming creates visceral scenes of his father's unhinged, irrational anger during his childhood in the Scottish countryside. He details the physical and psychological violence his father mercilessly heaped upon him, including a beating so ferocious he wanted to die, having his hair brutally shorn against his will with rusty clippers used on sheep, and hearing countless times that he was pathetic and useless. Cumming and his brother learned to shut down their emotions and suppress any feelings of joy, lest their vindictive, tyrannical father remove from their lives whatever gave them pleasure. As an adult, he freely expresses the authentic "pixielike" personality he abandoned in childhood, when he couldn't play and enjoy life. He also kept some totems from his childhood, miserable though it was (he even wore his father's sweater in his first headshot!), since he regards them as "a part of my happiness today, because it is a part of me." From discovering the truth about his grandfather's mysterious death to attempting to understand his father's sadistic nature, Cumming explains that it is important to be candid and forthright, that "there is never shame in being open and honest." A raw, revealing memoir from a courageous actor and writer.
