All The Fishes Come Home To

When Rachel was seven, in the early 80s, her parents whisked her off from America to join an ashram in a backwater town in India. They were followers of Meher Baba, best known for the slogan Don t worry, be happy . The ashram was populated by holy madmen and unhinged ageing hippies. Rachel was the only foreign child in a 100-mile radius.

As if wasn t enough to contend with, Racheal, the daughter of Jewish Baba-lovers, was bundled off to the Holy Wounds of Jesus Christ the Saviour School, a last vestige of the British empire staffed by nuns with a penchant for keeping their charges standing in the midday sun until they fainted. Surrounded by adults who were patently mad, and classmates who communicated by throwing rocks a t her, Rachel buried herself in comics, tamed the local wildlife and spent a lot of time avoiding her mother.

By turns heart-breakingly sad, jaw-droppingly strange and very very funny, this is a brilliant memoir of a distinctly odd childhood that makes you splutter with laughter and thank your lucky stars you grew up safely in the suburbs.