AustLit

'Inside Out is a story about survival and taking risks, about seizing the moment and living with the consequences, about the adventure of being alive. In this wonderful book, sometimes heartbreaking, sometimes funny, Robert Adamson tells the story of his childhood and early adulthood in fifties and sixties Australia - a world of milkbars, the bottle-O, fishing and V8s. A childhood in Neutral Bay and on the Hawkesbury nurtures his love of wildlife, which drives him to act on instinct, beginning with the spectacular theft of an exotic bird from Taronga Park Zoo. He then spends much of his adolescence in and out of boys' homes and later prisons. In between stints inside he works as a pastrycook and becomes besotted with the sultry, dark-haired Carol. Together they take off on a wild road trip to Queensland - a journey that could only ever have one ending. But prison has its own destiny for young Robert. It introduces this sensitive, responsive young man to the debating society, to books, and to a love affair with words. It sets alight Adamson's imagination and fosters his dream of becoming a writer. Inside Out is so much more than a memoir, it brims with life as Adamson unsentimentally re-creates his past experiences, no matter how dark or painful, with astonishing generosity and sympathy.' (Publication summary)