For fifteen-year-old Martin, growing up in Slough, the summer of 1977 means punk rock, reggae music, disco girls, stolen cars, social-club lager, cut-throat Teds and a job picking cherries with the gypsies. Life is sweet – until he is beaten up and thrown in the Grand Union Canal with his best mate Smiles.
Fast forward to 1988, and Joe is traveling home on the Trans-Siberian express after three years working in a Hong Kong bar, remembering the highs and lows of the intervening years as he comes to terms with catastrophe.
Fast forward to 2000, and Joe is sitting pretty – earning a living as a DJ, selling records and fight tickets. Life is sweet again – until a face from the past forces him to re-live that night in 1977 and deal with the fall-out.
( from the Sleeve, A Jonathan Cape Uncorrected Proof, paperback 352 pages )