Juano Diaz: Slum Boy

Celebrated visual artist and photographer Juano Diaz has written a beautiful and courageous memoir which reflects on his childhood in the 1970s Glasgow slums, being entered into the care system and how love for the mother he was forcibly taken from has shaped his life and identity. Soon after witnessing a drowning, his mother’s addictions take over their lives, leaving him starving in their flat, awaiting her return. Before long, the four-year-old John (the name his mother used for him), is placed in a children’s home, to be later adopted and raised within a loving but strict Catholic and Romany Gypsy community. With the pull of his roots proving too strong, John sets out to find his true identity, Juano Diaz, and how, against all odds, his unstoppable love for his mother sets him free. Andrew O’Hagan wrote, ‘This is a heart-breaking story, beautifully told. I hope it finds a million readers.’