I learned something about myself that night. When I get really shocking news, my entire body tries to get the hell away as quickly as possible. The repercussions of this bombshell would reverberate in my life for a long time to come.

A beloved star of stage and screen, Alan Cumming's life and career have been shaped by a complex and dark family past - full of troubled memories, kept buried away. But then an unexpected phone call from his long-estranged father brought the pain of the past hurtling back into the present, and unravelled everything he thought he knew about himself. Not My Father's Son is the story of his journey of discovery, both a memoir of his childhood in Scotland, and an investigation into his family history which would change him forever.