An extraordinarily brave memoir about faith, family, shame and addiction - an Observer, New Statesman and Sunday Times Book of the Year
'Brilliant... lively, engaging and extremely well written - scrupulously, painfully honest... sharply funny' PANDORA SYKES, SUBSTACK
Matt Rowland Hill grew up the son of a minister in an evangelical Christian church. It was a childhood fraught with bitter family conflict and the fear of damnation. After a devastating loss of faith in his late teens, Matt began his search for salvation elsewhere, eventually becoming addicted to crack and heroin - an ordeal that stretched over a decade and culminated in a period of hopeless darkness.
Recklessly honest, and as funny as it is grave, Original Sins is an extraordinary memoir of faith, family, shame and addiction. It's about looking for answers to life's big questions in all the wrong places, how hope can arrive in the most unexpected forms, and how the stories we tell might help us survive.
'Remarkable, funny, arrestingly well-written... Brings to mind Edward St Aubyn's Patrick Melrose novels, but is also entirely, exhilaratingly its own thing' The Times
'Electric... Artfully structured with novelistic verve... Hill is a blazing talent' Observer
'A beautifully controlled tale of a life spiralling out of control... One of the best books I've read this year' Sunday Times
LONGLISTED FOR THE BAILLIE GIFFORD PRIZE FOR NON-FICTION AND SHORTLISTED FOR THE SLIGHTLY FOXED BEST FIRST BIOGRAPHY PRIZE AND WALES BOOK OF THE YEAR AWARD
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Matt Rowland Hill
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'A stunningly well-written, funny, heartrending and utterly gripping memoir about learning how to live with who we are. Read it. Read it now' Nathan Filer
'Isn't everyone's childhood an indoctrination in the more or less deranged outlook of the people who raised them? And isn't growing up for everyone a more or less successful attempt to overcome their conditioning and see clearly, with their own eyes?'
Matt Rowland Hill grew up the son of a minister in an evangelical Christian church in south Wales and then south-east England. It was a childhood fraught with bitter family conflict, the ever-present threat of hell and damnation, and a burgeoning cycle of temptation, sin and shame. After a devastating loss of faith in his late teens, Matt began his search for salvation elsewhere, turning to books before developing a growing relationship with alcohol and drugs. He became addicted to crack and heroin in his early twenties, an ordeal that stretched over a decade and culminated in a period of hopeless darkness. This story takes us to his bleakest, most desperate moments and recounts his struggle towards the light.
Original Sins is an extraordinary memoir. It is a story of faith, family, loss, shame and addiction, but ultimately it is about survival, growing up and learning to live. It's recklessly honest, as funny as it is grave, courageous and compulsive.