Acknowledgements
Like Allie Burns, I was a journalist living and working in Glasgow in 1979. Working on 1979 has been a potent reminder of how much we forget …
Writing a novel set in the past always demands more research to get under the skin of another period, even if it’s still very much within living memory. For me, the quickest route to grasping the issues that concerned people and had an impact on their daily lives is to look at the newspapers of the times. I couldn’t have written 1979 without access to the archives of the Daily Record and the Glasgow Herald (as it was then). That was hugely complicated by the COVID restrictions we all lived under between March 2020 and March 2021, when I finished writing 1979. I want to thank the team at the National Library of Scotland who went out of their way to smooth my path to what limited archive access was available during that period. Everyone I encountered was friendly, helpful and careful. Your attitude made this book more authentic than it would otherwise have been.
That legend of Scottish journalism, Ruth Wishart, was Women’s Editor of the Daily Record when I joined in 1977. I owe her for a hilarious and insightful trip down memory lane and its disreputable back alleys, and for taking the time to read my first draft for accuracy and authenticity. Thanks too for the salmon and the breathtaking views …
Many of the details were provided or corroborated by other people’s expertise. In no particular order, my gratitude to Tommy Hughes (@TommyQH) for advice about Scottish banknotes; to Ruth Reed, Head of Archives & Art, NatWest Group for detailed descriptions and images of Scottish banknotes; to the Diageo archive staff for vodka notes; to the ever-stalwart source of so much of my forensic information, Professor Niamh Nic Daeid of the Leverhulme Research Centre for Forensic Science at the University of Dundee; to Christine Hamilton, for her recollections of the Citizens’ Theatre; to Paul Lyons, the fount of all knowledge relating to Glasgow Central station.
Reading other people’s work is also a powerful tool for understanding other times, other lives. Ruth Rendell, Reginald Hill, P.D. James, Ernest Tidyman, John Le Carré, Norman Mailer, Penelope Fitzgerald and Colin Dexter all transported me into very different heads from my own and reminded me of the seismic social changes of the last five decades. Among the non-fiction books I found helpful were:
Dominic Sandbrook: Seasons in the Sun
Ian Cobain: Anatomy of a Killing
Peter Taylor: The Provos: IRA and Sinn Fein
Peter Taylor: Brits: The War Against the IRA
Ed Moloney: Voices from the Grave: Two Men’s War in Ireland
Alwyn W. Turner: Crisis? What Crisis?
Julie Welch: The Fleet Street Girls
Thomas Grant: Court Number One: The Old Bailey Trials that Defined Modern Britain
William Leslie Webb (ed) Bedside Guardian: No. 28
Stuart Maconie: Hope and Glory
Thanks too to my support team at Little, Brown and at Grove Atlantic. You’ve all been amazing in this strange and often frightening year. This book would not be in the hands of readers without the tireless and imaginative work of Lucy Malagoni, Laura Sherlock, David Shelley, Amy Hundley, Anne O’Brien, Sean Garrehy, Cath Burke, Thalia Proctor, Kimberley Nyamhondera, Tilda McDonald, Brionee Fenlon, Gemma Shelley and Cal Kenny.
Thanks too to everyone at DHA who works with my books, particularly Jane Gregory, Stephanie Glencross, Camille Burns and Georgina Ruffhead. You’ve managed to keep the wheels turning in spite of everything.
And the booksellers … ! Booksellers have been heroic over the last year. Innovative in how they engage with customers, whether via click and collect or events across many different platforms; supportive of readers and writers alike; but most of all, feeding our imaginations with a million different worlds.
This has been a year like no other. I was in lockdown with my partner Jo for much of it. We never ran out of conversation, we were never bored, we never failed to challenge each other or explore a vast and sometimes bizarre range of topics, or to laugh at ourselves. (We binged a lot of box sets too …) Not a day went by that I wasn’t conscious of how lucky I am. And that millions of others were far less fortunate than us. Kudos to Jo for keeping me sane and keeping me going when writing felt impossible in the teeth of what was going on around us.
Onwards, my friends.
My 1979 Top 40
In no particular order, this is the forty-track rotation I listened to when I was researching, prepping and writing 1979. They were all released in the late 1970s, though not all in 1979 itself. But then, like Allie, we all listen to tunes from our past …
I hope it gets you in the mood for reading!
‘Picture This’ – Blondie
‘Lovely Day’ – Bill Withers
‘Automatic Lover’ – Dee D. Jackson
‘Brass in Pocket’ – The Pretenders
‘It’s a Heartache’ – Bonnie Tyler
‘Wild West Hero’ – Electric Light Orchestra
‘Because the Night’ – Patti Smith
‘Into the Valley’ – The Skids
‘YMCA’ – Village People
‘Like Clockwork’ – Boomtown Rats
‘Stayin’ Alive’ – Bee Gees
‘Uptown Top Ranking’ – Althea & Donna
‘No More Heroes’ – The Stranglers
‘Take a Chance on Me’ – Abba
‘Werewolves of London’ – Warren Zevon
‘Psycho Killer’ – Talking Heads
‘Kiss You All Over’ – Exile
‘Top of the Pops’ – Rezillos
‘Heroes’ – David Bowie
‘Don’t Hang Up’ – 10cc
‘English Civil War’ – The Clash
‘2-4-6-8-Motorway’ – Tom Robinson Band
‘Rebel Rebel’ – David Bowie
‘Glad to be Gay’ – Tom Robinson Band
‘Heaven Can Wait’ – Meatloaf
‘It’s Different for Girls’ – Joe Jackson
‘The Man With the Child in His Eyes’ – Kate Bush
‘Go Your Own Way’ – Fleetwood Mac
‘Sex and Drugs and Rock ‘n’ Roll’ – Ian Dury
‘David Watts’ – The Jam
‘Until the Night’ – Billy Joel
‘Rikki, Don’t Lose That Number’ – Steely Dan
‘Watching the Detectives’ – Elvis Costello
‘(I Am Always Touched by Your) Presence, Dear’ – Blondie
‘I Will Survive’ – Gloria Gaynor
‘Goodbye Girl’ – Squeeze
‘Make Me Smile (Come up and See Me)’ – Steve Harley
‘Girls Talk’ – Dave Edmunds
‘I Fought the Law’ – The Clash
‘Life in a Day’ – Simple Minds
1979 Page 34
