Patti Smith, punk priestess and poetic chronicler of life’s beauty and ache, returns this fall with Bread of Angels, her third memoir and perhaps her most vulnerable to date. Arriving November 4 through Random House, the book dives deep into Smith’s formative years, her bond with husband Fred “Sonic” Smith of MC5, and the quiet strength of motherhood in the shadow of profound loss.
“It took a decade to write this book, grappling with the beauty and sorrow of a lifetime,” Smith shared. “I’m hoping that people will find something they need.” The release date is deeply symbolic—marking both the birthday of Robert Mapplethorpe, Smith’s lifelong muse, and the anniversary of Fred Smith’s passing.
While Just Kids immortalized her bohemian youth with Mapplethorpe in 1970s New York, and M Train meditated on travel, solitude, and memory, Bread of Angels shifts the lens toward the personal and domestic. From her working-class roots in Philadelphia and New Jersey to the move to Michigan to raise a family, Smith unearths a quieter revolution—one found in love, loss, and the act of rebuilding through art.
The memoir traces her teenage awakenings to poetry, the recording of landmark albums like Horses and Easter, and the years spent navigating life beyond the spotlight. Through grief and gratitude, Smith writes with a lyricism only she can conjure—transforming the everyday into the transcendent.
Her pen is not the only thing returning this year. Smith will also hit the road for a 50th anniversary tour of Horses, performing the seminal 1975 album in full with longtime collaborators Lenny Kaye and Jay Dee Daugherty. The global tour comes just months after a brief health scare in São Paulo, which Smith brushed off with characteristic grace and humility.
Now, as 2025 unfolds, Bread of Angels offers readers a map through the wilderness of the human condition—written by an artist who has walked it all and still believes in the redemptive power of song, word, and spirit.