Turning Points: A Memoir

"I chose to record my story...to let those who may come from a similar background as me know that where you start does not have to be where you finish. Opportunities for advancement are there if you are willing to work hard and make smart decisions. My road to success was not straight, but rather, a series of critical turning points. Yours can be too."

In a political career that spanned decades, Derrick Smith has earned respect and acclaim in his island home Jamaica as an upstanding politician and a caring member of Parliament. Born at Fleet Street, Central Kingston, the oldest of eight children for his parents, Smith was raised by an aunt in the countryside before returning to the city to complete his secondary school education. Emerging from a lower-middle-class milieu to the heights of political office, Smith tells the story of his personal and professional life in this candid memoir.

From Calabar and CAST, to Goodyear and GraceKennedy; the Jaycees and the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP), Smith takes readers on the journey from his youth to adolescence, adulthood, and political awakening. He holds nothing back in recounting rivalrous friendships with political opponents as well as the tests to his loyalty brought to bear by the differing strategies and styles of successive JLP leaders. His close-knit family, sound friendships, and the love of horse-racing have sustained him through devastating health scares and personal humiliation.

In Turning Points, Derrick Smith tells his story, chronicling the experiences that shaped his life. Unflinchingly straightforward and deeply personal, Smith's self-aware reflections of lessons learnt are characteristically clement yet unequivocally frank and direct as he shares the brightest and darkest moments of his life in this enlightening memoir.