Bread of Angels

'Smith's eye for life's everyday transcendence rarely fails her' Sunday Times, 'Books of the Year'
'A triumph' Joseph O'Connor, Irish Times, 'Books of the Year'
'Quietly sacred, utterly beautiful' Service95
'Smith has already issued a handful of memoirs over the decades. Bread of Angels feels like the big one' TLS

A radiant new memoir from beloved artist and writer Patti Smith, author of the National Book Award Winner Just Kids.

God whispers through a crease in the wallpaper , writes Patti Smith in this indelible account of her life as an artist. A post-Second World War childhood unfolds in a condemned housing complex described in Dickensian detail: consumptive children, vanishing neighbours, an infested rat house, and a beguiling book of Irish fairytales. We enter the child's world of the imagination where Smith, the captain of her loyal and beloved sibling army, vanquishes bullies, communes with the king of tortoises and searches for sacred silver pennies.

The most intimate of Smith's memoirs, Bread of Angels takes us through her teenage years where the first glimmers of art and romance take hold. Arthur Rimbaud and Bob Dylan emerge as creative heroes and role models as Patti starts to write poetry, then lyrics, merging both into the iconic songs and recordings such as Horses and Easter, 'Dancing Barefoot' and 'Because the Night'.