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Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood Paperback – Feb. 12 2019
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Trevor Noah’s unlikely path from apartheid South Africa to the desk of The Daily Show began with a criminal act: his birth. Trevor was born to a white Swiss father and a black Xhosa mother at a time when such a union was punishable by five years in prison. Living proof of his parents’ indiscretion, Trevor was kept mostly indoors for the earliest years of his life, bound by the extreme and often absurd measures his mother took to hide him from a government that could, at any moment, steal him away. Finally liberated by the end of South Africa’s tyrannical white rule, Trevor and his mother set forth on a grand adventure, living openly and freely and embracing the opportunities won by a centuries-long struggle.
Born a Crime is the story of a mischievous young boy who grows into a restless young man as he struggles to find himself in a world where he was never supposed to exist. It is also the story of that young man’s relationship with his fearless, rebellious, and fervently religious mother—his teammate, a woman determined to save her son from the cycle of poverty, violence, and abuse that would ultimately threaten her own life.
The eighteen personal essays collected here are by turns hilarious, dramatic, and deeply affecting. Whether subsisting on caterpillars for dinner during hard times, being thrown from a moving car during an attempted kidnapping, or just trying to survive the life-and-death pitfalls of dating in high school, Trevor illuminates his curious world with an incisive wit and unflinching honesty. His stories weave together to form a moving and searingly funny portrait of a boy making his way through a damaged world in a dangerous time, armed only with a keen sense of humor and a mother’s unconventional, unconditional love.
- Print length304 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherAnchor Canada
- Publication dateFeb. 12 2019
- Dimensions13.82 x 1.88 x 20.88 cm
- ISBN-100385689241
- ISBN-13978-0385689243
- Lexile measureHL770L
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Product description
Review
A New York Times Bestseller
Winner of the 2017 Thurber Prize for American Humour
A New York Times Top Book of 2016
A New York Times Notable Book
An Esquire Best Book
A CBC Best Book
An NPR Best Book
A Booklist Editors' Choice, 2016
"[A] compelling new memoir. . . . By turns alarming, sad and funny, [the] book provides a harrowing look, through the prism of Mr. Noah's family, at life in South Africa under apartheid and the country's lurching entry into a postapartheid era in the 1990s." —The New York Times
"[A] stirring memoir. . . . Noah proves to be a gifted storyteller, able to deftly lace his poignant tales with amusing irony." —Entertainment Weekly
"Born a Crime is an engaging, fast-paced and vivid read. . . . The book is essential reading not only because it is a personal story of survival, leavened with insight and wit, but because it does more to expose apartheid—its legacy, its pettiness, its small-minded stupidity and its damage—than any other recent history book or academic text." —The Guardian (UK)
"[A] substantial collection of staggering personal essays. . . . Incisive, funny and vivid, these true tales are anchored to his portrait of his courageous, rebellious and religious mother who defied racially restrictive laws to secure an education and a career for herself—and to have a child with a white Swiss/German even though sex between whites and blacks was illegal. . . . [Trevor Noah's] electrifying memoir sparkles with funny stories . . . and his candid and compassionate essays deepen our perception of the complexities of race, gender and class." —Booklist, starred review
"A gritty memoir . . . studded with insight and provocative social criticism . . . with flashes of brilliant storytelling and acute observations." —Kirkus Reviews
"[Noah's] story of surviving—and thriving—is mind-blowing." —Cosmopolitan
"Noah's memoir is extraordinary in its observations of South Africa in the years when apartheid crumbled. It's equally unusual in the troubling personal story it tells. Throw in Noah's sharp, droll prose style, and you have a book that feels like essential reading on every level." —The Seattle Times
"What makes Born a Crime such a soul-nourishing pleasure, even with all its darker edges and perilous turns, is reading Noah recount in brisk, warmly conversational prose how he learned to negotiate his way through the bullying and ostracism. . . . What also helped was having a mother like Patricia Nombuyiselo Noah. . . . Consider Born a Crime another such gift to her—and an enormous gift to the rest of us." —USA Today
"You'd be hard-pressed to find a comic's origin story better than the one Trevor Noah serves up in Born a Crime." —O: The Oprah Magazine
"Witty and revealing . . . Noah's story is the story of modern South Africa; though he enjoyed some privileges of the region's slow Westernization, his formative years were shaped by poverty, injustice and violence. Noah is quick with a disarming joke, and he skillfully integrates the parallel narratives via interstitial asides between chapters. . . . Perhaps the most harrowing tales are those of his abusive stepfather, which form the book's final act (and which Noah cleverly foreshadows throughout earlier chapters), but equally prominent are the laugh-out-loud yarns about going to the prom and the differences between 'White Church' and 'Black Church.'" —Publishers Weekly, starred review
"[Noah] thrives with the help of his astonishingly fearless mother. . . . Their fierce bond makes this story soar." —People
"Extraordinarily heartfelt, compulsively enriching . . . a hell of a memoir. . . . With his debut book, Mr. Noah produces a striking, evocative, constantly surprising, tremendously heartbreaking, persistently funny and absorbing true-life account, one that never fails to capture his clear-eyed conviction, echoing pathos, sharp perception and sense of humor. . . . Trevor Noah is a rich storyteller." —Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
"Humorous and heartbreaking." —Los Angeles Times
About the Author
Product details
- Publisher : Anchor Canada (Feb. 12 2019)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 304 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0385689241
- ISBN-13 : 978-0385689243
- Item weight : 240 g
- Dimensions : 13.82 x 1.88 x 20.88 cm
- Best Sellers Rank: #2,512 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #2 in Improvisation in Theatre
- #8 in Comedy (Books)
- #14 in Humorous Essays (Books)
- Customer Reviews:
About the author

Trevor Noah is the most successful comedian in Africa and is the host of the Emmy® and Peabody® Award-winning “The Daily Show” on Comedy Central. Under Trevor, “The Daily Show with Trevor Noah” has broken free from the restraints of a 30-minute linear show, producing engaging social content, award-winning digital series, podcasts and more for its global audience. In 2020, “The Daily Show with Trevor Noah” received eight Emmy nominations, including Outstanding Variety Talk Series and Outstanding Writing for A Variety Series. Trevor also received NAACP Image Award nominations for Outstanding Writing in a Comedy Series and Outstanding Host in a Talk or News/Information (Series or Special). “The Daily Show with Trevor Noah” also received Webby Awards for Best in Comedy and Best Web Personality/Host, as well as a NAACP Image Award nomination for Outstanding Talk Series. Trevor originally joined “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart” in 2014 as a contributor.
In 2019, “The Daily Show with Trevor Noah” received two Primetime Emmy nominations, including Outstanding Variety Talk Series and Outstanding Interactive Program. Additionally, Trevor received the 2019 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Writing in a Comedy Series, as well as nominations for Outstanding Talk Series, Outstanding Variety Show, Outstanding host in a Talk or News/Information. In 2018, “The Daily Show” won a GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding Talk Episode and received nominations for a Writers Guild Award (Comedy/Variety Series) as well as two NAACP Image Awards, for Outstanding Talk Series and Outstanding Host in a Talk or News/Information Show. Trevor also won Best Host at the 2017 MTV Movie & TV Awards, as well as a 2017 Creative Arts Emmy Award for Outstanding Short Form Variety Series for his hosting role on “The Daily Show – Between The Scenes.”
Born in South Africa to a black South African mother and a white European father, Noah has hosted numerous television shows including South Africa’s music, television and film awards, and two seasons of his own late-night talk show, “Tonight with Trevor Noah.”
Trevor has written, produced, and starred in 11 comedy specials, including his most recent, “Trevor Noah: Son of Patricia,” which launched in November 2018 on Netflix. The special touches upon racism, immigration, camping and more. “Trevor Noah: Son Of Patricia” received a NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Variety Show, as well as a Grammy Award nomination for Best Comedy Album. Other recent stand-up specials in “Trevor Noah: Afraid of the Dark” (2017) on Netflix and “Trevor Noah: Lost in Translation” (2016) on Comedy Central. Noah was the subject of David Paul Meyer's award-winning documentary film “You Laugh But It's True” which tells the story of his remarkable career in post-apartheid South Africa. His Showtime comedy special, “Trevor Noah: African American” premiered in 2013. He was nominated for "Personality of the Year" at the 2014 and 2015 MTV Africa Music Awards and won the award in 2015.
Trevor's success has also spanned to sold out shows over 5 continents. Trevor crossed North America on his first ever arena outing with the “Loud & Clear Tour 2019.” Due to popular demand, Trevor expanded his Loud & Clear Tour to 2020. With over 75 sold-out North American shows to date, including his sold-out show at Madison Square Garden, Trevor is bringing his wildly successful tour to new cities, across the U.S. and Europe.
In 2019, Trevor launched a new podcast series “The Trevor Noah Podcast” exclusively on Luminary. In his podcast, Trevor challenges himself – and all of his listeners – to explore unfamiliar angles, embrace differing viewpoints, and celebrate the contradictions that make the modern world both bewildering and exciting. In 2020, “The Trevor Noah Podcast” won the Webby Award and Webby People’s Voice Award for News & Politics (Podcasts).
Trevor Noah is the author of the #1 New York Times bestseller “Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood” and its young readers adaptation “It’s Trevor Noah: Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood,” which also debuted as a New York Times bestseller. The book received the Thurber Prize for American Humor and two NAACP Image Awards, one for Outstanding Literary Work by a Debut Author and another for Outstanding Literary Work in the Biography/Auto-Biography category.
“Born A Crime” is a collection of personal stories about growing up in South Africa during the last gasps of apartheid and the tumultuous days of freedom that came with its demise. Already known for his incisive social and political commentary, here Noah turns his focus inward, giving readers an intimate look at the world that shaped him. These are true stories,sometimes dark, occasionally bizarre, frequently tender, and always hilarious. Whether subsisting on caterpillars during months of extreme poverty or making comically hapless attempts at teenage romance, from the time he was thrown in jail to the time he was thrown from a speeding car driven by murderous gangsters, the experiences covered in this book will shock and amaze, even as they leave you rolling on the floor with laughter.
The Audible edition of “Born a Crime,” performed by Trevor, was produced by Audible and remains one of the top-selling, highest-rated, and most-commented-on Audible performances of all time. “Born a Crime” won the Audie Award for “Best Male Narrator,” and was also nominated in the “Autobiography/Memoir,” “Best Narration by the Author” and “Audiobook of the Year” categories. To date, “Born a Crime” has sold over 1 million copies across all formats. The paperback version of “Born a Crime” came out in February 2019. In April 2019, Trevor released “It’s Trevor Noah: Born a Crime,” adapted for young readers. The book not only provides a fascinating and honest perspective on South Africa’s racial history, but it will inspire young readers looking to improve their own lives.
Trevor’s production company, Day Zero Productions, recently partnered with Viacom and already has several projects in development, including the feature film adaptation of Born a Crime starring Academy Award winner Lupita Nyong’o, which is set up at Paramount Players. Additionally, Trevor is set to produce an upcoming film built around the Adewumi family, specifically 8-year-old Tani who won the 2019 New York chess championship and whose family became an inspiration to many.
In April 2018, Noah launched The Trevor Noah Foundation, a youth development initiative that enhances youth preparedness for higher education or entry into the workforce. Noah’s vision is a South Africa that advances because each generation builds and must grow beyond its predecessor. Through a partnership with Microsoft, the foundation is able to provide under-resourced schools with the opportunity to use technology as a tool to enhance the learning experience, as well as increase digital literacy beyond the classroom.
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I must say there were stories I could not relate to but I felt them. And then there were events he talked about that I experienced myself being a Palestinian in a country under occupation.
I highly recommend this book.
He writes about his upbringing in South Africa. He explains that he has a black mother and a white father, hence the name of the book "Born a Crime." We hear how he moved from various sections of the city where he was not supposed to live. In South Africa, it's not a question of black or white people. There people are known as Black, Coloured and White and must live according to their skin tone. Since Trevor is very light skinned but not white enough for South Africa, he technically couldn't live with his mother in the black neighbourhood. But his mother did not believe she should have to live in the Black "hood", so she secretly lived in the white area. You'll have to read the book to see how she pulled it off. He takes us through his school days and his unruly early life. He explains how he changed from committing petty crimes to becoming a DJ and later a comedian. But the book comes to a sudden end when he tells us about a terribly tragedy which befell him in his early twenties.
Unfortunately he stops there and we don't get to find out how he arrived in the U.S.A. If he immigrated to America or got his television job and is there on a work visa. If the States will be his permanent home or he intends to get back to South Africa in the future. We also don't learn anything about his personal life or how he enjoys his Daily show venture. Maybe he plans to write another book down the road. If so, I'd buy it.
Top reviews from other countries


My rating for the book: ★★★★★
Certainly an unputdownable book. Storytelling is like joke telling and Trevor is a natural storyteller. He knew his punch lines. He can move you with incidents that victimized him and his family and at the same time make you laugh without you realizing that it's poverty that he's going through.
Phil Knight's Shoe Dog talks about a person who never gave up and fought all the odds to make a "once-in-a-lifetime-brand" and you close it with a lot of inspiration and motivation. Whereas while closing this book, you would want to see a person as a person than a white or black or colored. You get better in terms of treating people and definitely, this book is beyond motivation.
Trevor could've easily made this book a massive bestseller by just telling his underdog story in a third-world country and how he became a massive success in a first-world country but he went past that and gave you the real face behind the apartheid and the South African history which gave a history to the blacks and whites but not the coloreds. He went past just making you laugh just like he does in his shows and made sure that you empathized with the sufferings of the "black tax".
Responsible writing that you cannot afford to miss. Pick it right away!

We're told that Trevor being mixed race, a crime during apartheid, meant that he had to be hidden away and that his grandmother wouldn't let him leave the house or even play in the yard - but then we're also told that he was so well known in the neighbourhood that people would point him and his mother out, and also that they went to three different churches (black, white and coloured) several times a week. He also talks about how his mother paid no mind to the rules and that she and Trevor went everywhere and experienced lots of different things - so which is it? Was he hidden away for fear that the authorities would take him away, or was living a full and varied life with a mum determined to give him many experiences? Since he makes both these claims, how are we to know?
Similarly, we're told that he and his mother were so poor that they often resorted to eating broth from bones the butcher sold for dog food, but then he talks about the weekly car trips he and his mother took, and how his mother would buy a ton of fireworks every single year for Guy Fawkes. Another example is how he talks about being very aware of the constant threat of danger and violence, but then talks about how his scholarship to a private school from the age of three meant it was years before he was aware of the reality of apartheid. It all quickly smacks of a narrator who is wildly exaggerating the story at one end or the other and who can't keep track of what they've said, which then stops the reader feeling at all invested. Everyone knows that autobiographies aren't 100% accurate, but so many contradictions just gets annoying, fast.
I'll often plough to the end of a book even if it's annoying me, but I checked out at the point where Trevor talks about how in their culture, black cats were perceived as witches, and how his mother got two black kittens anyway. When they returned home one day to find them dead, horribly mutilated and hanging from their gate, Trevor's reaction was simply to think that cats are dicks anyway, and the cats deserved it for not showing him affection. This seemed to be not only the reaction he had at the time, but the way he still feels about it in retrospect, so I had no interest in reading any further. Glad I only spent 99p on the kindle version, but it wasn't even worth that.

I can scarcely believe the copyright of this book is 2016. Like so many of us, I got to know Trevor a bit better via his Behind the Scenes clips of The Daily Show as well as other additional content. Trevor's one of the most engaging and people-oriented personalities in comedy today; there seems to be no end to his insight on any given topic.
This book gives readers the framework from where the dynamo Trevor Noah grew his roots; not only do we learn his personal experience, we learn historical precedence about the country of South Africa and the regions around it. It was extremely gratifying to read about real human experience AND real history during the demoralizing time period of apartheid practice and not merely the overtly glossed-over blip of it in most western-backed media.
I loved learning about how the once-incorrigible character trait led to Trevor getting out of trouble perhaps more than it led to him landing in trouble. I loved learning how Patricia never stopped being her own person, never quit, never gave up on herself or her sons. I loved learning how for years and years, Trevor's father secretly always kept track of his work and career. And it's all of the book's multiple threads are all woven together with Trevor's one of a kind sense of humor, of course.
This was such a remarkable and unique read and I cannot recommend it enough!!

Reading 'Born A Crime' was such an eye-opening insight into what was actually going on during and after Apartheid. Firstly, Noah is only 33. Apartheid ended in living memory. It's a terrifying thought, how recent that is. Which leads onto my next point: we weren't taught about this nearly enough.
It's always different hearing about these sorts of experiences from someone who lived through it. Particularly because Noah is biracial. He didn't look black enough to be black, despite growing up around black people and never seeing himself as anything else. But he also wasn't white enough to be white. His family weren't particularly well-off. He didn't have the latest brands. He fit in enough that he was still an outsider, always flitting from group to group.
His mother, thought, is a force to be reckoned with. She's incredibly strong and independent. As a single mother with a biracial child she had to be. She actively sought out ways to undermine the white authorities. It was Noah and his mother against the world. A team. It was wonderful to read about such a strong family bond. Despite everything going crazy around them they had each other.
This isn't just the story of a young man's rise to fame, but a story of family, support, and unconditional love.