In 1993, Picador celebrates its 21st anniversary. This book marks this event. Twenty-one authors who have contributed to Picador's success were each invited to write and choose a year in Picador's existence which had affected them personally. The years were 1972 to 1992 inclusive and reasons for chosing their year ranged from the intensely personal to the entirely objective, sometimes linked to their writing, sometimes not. Thus Oliver Sacks chose 1972, the year his mother died and the year he wrote "Awakenings" while Tariq Ali, author of "Redemption" and "Shadows of the Pomegranate Tree", writes about cricket in 1992. The full list of authors includes: Tariq Ali 1992, Julian Barnes 1981, David Carridaine 1989, Jim Grace 1979, Bret Easton Ellis 1986, Russell Hoban 1975, Christopher Hope 1988, Tama Janowitz 1985, Clive James 1982, Mark Lawson 1984, Kathy Lette 1991, Norman Lewis 1990, Patrick McCabe 1973, Ian McEwan 1976, Candia McWilliam 1980, Charles Nicholl 1977, Caryl Phillips 1978, Oliver Sacks 1972, Graham Swift 1974, Edmund White 1983, Tobias Wolff 1987.