Wow, I don’t even know where to begin with this review. I’ve always been a fan of Jimmy Barnes music, having grown up with my parents playing Cold Chisel and his solo music. As I’ve gotten older and followed him on social media, and have been lucky enough to see him perform live, I’ve seen what a great performer he is but also seen how important his family is to him.

On the periphery, I always knew Jimmy had had a tough up bringing but what I thought I knew about his childhood was completely blown out of the water by reading this book. Jimmy writes candidly about what it was to be a child of a working class, immigrant family in the 1960’s in Adelaide. Being brought up in a household, family and wider community, where alcoholism, abuse and domestic violence were part of the “norm” and wasn’t discussed, as that’s just what happened in life.

Working Class Boy begins with Jimmy as a young child living in the slums of Glasgow and ends with him leaving Adelaide to pursue his music career with Cold Chisel. Everything in between is a deeply personal, honest, darkly funny, at times uncomfortable and often confronting account of Jimmy’s early life, the years that shaped him into the man he was to become.

I highly recommend this book, but not to those who are faint of heart, and I’m keen to read the follow on book Working Class Man.