It was difficult growing up as a daughter of an author; I was born and lived in Pakistan until the age of 10 and during that time have very few memories of dad being home and with the family. As a very young child, I always remember him being away on his travels, years at a time. He would send presents home, dolls, books and puzzles just to remind us that he was there and that he had thought of us. He never really changed; he continued to travel for years at a time throughout his entire life taking him to and fro from Heathrow airport until his last trip which was to New York (his second home) and finally stopping over in Lima Peru for a month. In 1974 dad had me, my mother and my two sisters’ move over and join him in England where he had decided to settle down and worked as an English Teacher in a local school. As a child I did not really know or understand what dad was doing, of his plans or of his writings and just how serious he was about being a published writer. He would ask me to type up his hand written manuscripts which I did so many times over and over again and it was not until late 80’s whilst working as an estate agent in my local town that I went out for lunch and walked passed my local library to see a large poster advertising the release of a new book ‘Love Bones And Water’ by Adam Zameenzad an up-coming new author with great reviews. I was amazed and quietly proud….. Wow this was my Dad. That was the day I first came to realise that my dad was a published author and was famous and that all his hard work was all coming together. He went on to write four more books before he fell ill in 2000; in total he published six books, The 13th House being his first book and became the winner of the David Higham Prize award and then going on to write My Friend Matt, Loves Bones and Water, Cyrus Cyrus, Gorgeous White Female and his last book Pepsi and Maria. He was a traveller, a humanitarian and a much accomplished author who wanted to be the voice for the hungry and the poor, for the repressed and the silenced. His books covered many subjects but what stands out is that he wrote about subjects that were at the time either controversial on contemporary events or with a very forward thinking mind. His book Gorgeous White Female which depicts male sexuality through the eyes and life of an eleven year old boy who despises his father and yearns to be like his English middle class mother; the book conjures up the sexual and emotional maelstrom of a young boy on the verge of adulthood and reviewed by the ‘Gay Times’ magazine as ‘witty, wise and consistently entertaining.’ A story so contemporary in our times that I decided to have it re-published as an Ebook and to follow in line with his footsteps I have chosen a charity who cares for the homeless people to donate part of the proceeds from each book sold as dad had huge compassion and love for people who were lost and vulnerable and almost until his death, he went to the Quakers in Rochester on a Sunday to help feed the homeless and the hungry.. You can buy it here with PayPal - I hope you enjoy it!
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AuthorFrom his daughter Samia. Archives
March 2023
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