
Shop
Fatherless
A memoir by Phil Barber
When his Polish war veteran father denies paternity, the infant Phil is left with his poverty-stricken Mother Annie in a 1950s West Yorkshire mill town. Burned by loss and desertion, Annie's mental state frequently breaks apart. Before his third birthday she releases Phil to a distant orphanage. A series of subsequent separations take their toll on this spirited, imaginative boy who - at every turn - feels violently cast off and set a drift.
​
In this memoir of life under the roof of a 1960s orphanage Phil Barber has travelled with love and a wry humour into the dark earth of his tangled roots. Fatherless is an account of a displaced boy reaching through a lonely childhood and desperate adolescence to forge his way to manhood. Phil's story is a winding river of struggles for identity, and a search for beauty and belonging among the oceanic pain of feeling exiled from society.
​
Only £14.99 for personally signed copies.
Delivered free
Email: phil@philbarbercoaching.co.uk
Only £12.99 Amazon
( delivered free IN UK ONLY )

Testimonials

‘It touches on the experiences of young boys everywhere’.
G.S
​
‘Beautifully written, one of the best memoirs I’ve ever read’. A.W.
​
‘Fantastic book! Couldn't put it down, felt truly inspired that no matter how bad things are you can move forward and make a different life’.
L.F.
​
‘Once you start reading this book it’s hard to put down.’
I.C.
​
‘The self-insight and the honesty with which the author shares his childhood memories of rejection and loss with the reader is both humbling and inspiring.'
M.B.
​
‘I was expecting it to be depressing and even sordid in parts but somehow the excellent writing tells the story unflinchingly without making it a harrowing read. It details the day-to-day life of a kid growing up without parents or warm home atmosphere, without pathos, so that you find yourself fascinated by the events not often brought down by them’.
A.S
​
​