The Roots’ Black Thought to release new memoir

The Roots‘ co-founder Black Thought is coming out with a new release, and this time it’s not music. Variety reports the rapper, born Tariq Trotter, will be sharing his life story in a memoir titled The Upcycled Self.

The book will start with the story of Trotter burning down his family home as a child and include “dramatic stories of the four powerful relationships that shaped him — community, friends, art, and family — each a complex weave of love, discovery, trauma, and loss.”  

“This is the beautifully bluesy story of a boy genius’s coming of age that illuminates the redemptive power of the upcycle,” an announcement for the book says, according to Variety, defining “upcycle” as “to recycle (something) in such a way that the resulting product is of a higher value than the original item” and “to create an object of greater value from (a discarded object of lesser value).”

The Upcycled Self will release November 14 on One World.