Little Big Man

Stanley J. Browne is an actor, and he has been an actor all his life. Born to a Jamaican mother in a London suburb, he began rehearsing for the role of survivor from an early age. From birth he knew nothing but a home filled with love and the vibrancy of a Caribbean culture, but this changes when his mother is diagnosed with schizophrenia. In this honest and gripping memoir, Stanley reflects on a childhood and adolescence torn apart by mental disorder. Because of it, he adopts the mantle of 'man of the house' as he is forced to scavenge for food and miss school, with his two sisters, to care for his baby brother. His life is further fragmented as they yo-yo in and out of the care system and Stanley must face the reality of being separated from his siblings. An intelligent and sensitive child, Stanley descends into a life of crime and drug abuse. During his time spent in various young offender's institutions and prisons he battles with addiction and slowly begins to turn his life around. Set against a backdrop of 1970s poverty, racism and hardship, Little Big Man is a powerful story of generational trauma and one man's determination to heal the wounds of the past. Most of all, it is a book about the universal desire for love, belonging and the search to find an authentic voice through the redemptive power of creativity and recovery.