Manchester Trilogy – serie

A young warehouseman, his promising football career cut short by injury, counts flanges, valves and couplings for a living. He longs for the warmth and women of the office, but the prostitutes who hang around the high-rise are easier to deal with. Drink provides relief, if not escape, and probably the last thing he should dream of becoming is a writer, but then he buys himself a note pad and pen.This debut novel by Neil Campbell, author of the short story collections Broken Doll and Pictures From Hopper, is a moving and darkly comic meditation on the challenge of trying to realise dreams in a harsh and unfair world.

In this, the second volume of a projected Manchester trilogy, the young writer takes a zero-hours job in a mail-sorting depot but struggles to cope with the demands of menial work and the attitudes of his colleagues. Only after rescuing and acquiring a pet tortoise does he realise what is most lacking in his life: intimacy. Embarking on a handful of sexual misadventures, he continues to struggle as a writer. He sees the city in which he was born and brought up changing all around him and, when he gets sacked from the sorting office, some hard choices lie ahead.A powerful indictment of austerity politics and Brexit Britain, the novel never loses sight of its working-class characters’ dignity and humanity, and Campbell’s mordantly witty dialogue ensures that the next laugh is never far away. Gripping in its fascination with the everyday, Zero Hours is keenly observed, blackly funny and ultimately uplifting.

The third part of Neil Campbell’s Manchester Trilogy, in which our struggling young writer finds love with a girl called Cho. Where a love song to Manchester becomes a love song to Cho.Lanyards explores how the jobs we wear around our necks dictate the ways we are identified.Building on the previous novel in the trilogy, Zero Hours, our protagonist finds himself on universal credit, taking agency jobs, moving from learning support work in schools and colleges to call centre jobs and back again, via a failed attempt at getting a job as a driver on the Metrolink tram network. Lanyards portrays the comic and poignant moments of working life. All the time reflecting back on the football career the narrator might have had were he not injured, his life as a writer, his experiences of being in a mixed race couple with the Hong Kong born Cho, the Manchester Arena bombing, the continuing success of his beloved Manchester City, the child sex abuse scandals in football, the disparities of wealth in contemporary Britain, and the death of a childhood friend that continues to haunt him.

Book 1 in this gritty Manchester crime trilogy. When your enemies get close, family loyalty is all you can trust. Brother and sister Peter and Adele Robinson never stood a chance. Dragged up by an alcoholic, violent father, and a weak, beaten mother, their childhood in Manchester only prepared them for a life of crime and struggle. But Adele is determined to break the mould. She studies hard at school and, inspired by her beloved grandmother Joyce, she finally makes a successful life for herself on her own. Peter is not so lucky. Getting more and more immersed in the murky world of crime and gangs, his close bonds with Adele gradually loosen until they look set to break altogether. But old habits die hard, and one devastating night, Adele is forced to confront her violent past. Dragged back into her worst nightmares, there''s only one person she can turn to when her life is on the line – her brother Peter. After all, blood is thicker than water...

From the bestselling author of BORN BAD. Adele Robinson is locked up – convicted for the murder of her abusive father. She quickly realises that she''ll have to play it tough if she''s going to survive, and soon gains a reputation for standing her ground. Meanwhile, her brother Peter is building his criminal empire on the outside – running protection rackets, seedy nightclubs and all manner of schemes to make a fast buck. He soon comes to the attention of not only the police but also Manchester''s rival gangs, and a turf war breaks out. And when things start to get bloody, only Adele can step in to protect the family business. Will she get out in time to save Peter? After all, blood is thicker than water, and when family''s in trouble you can''t look the other way.

When Adele''s brother, Peter, gets banged up for GBH she reluctantly agrees to run his nightclub, The Golden Bell. Strong opposition from Peter''s thuggish number two, Glynn, who isn''t best pleased about answering to a woman, isn''t the only challenge she faces. The Manchester club scene of the 1990s is a dangerous place, at the mercy of illicit protection rackets and rampaging gangs, and, despite Adele''s efforts to keep everything legal, the club is beginning to feel like a poisoned chalice. Meanwhile, Glynn is playing his own ruthless game, and when a savage gang attack has devastating consequences Adele is ready to walk away. But Peter has always stood by her and she owes him big time. Besides, where else would an ex-con find work? And someone has to protect her brother''s empire from his enemies. Right now, Adele knows she is the only one that Peter can trust, but the stakes may soon get too high...

From the bestselling author of BORN BAD. Adele Robinson is locked up – convicted for the murder of her abusive father. She quickly realises that she’ll have to play it tough if she's going to survive, and soon gains a reputation for standing her ground. Meanwhile, her brother Peter is building his criminal empire on the outside – running protection rackets, seedy nightclubs and all manner of schemes to make a fast buck. He soon comes to the attention of not only the police but also Manchester's rival gangs, and a turf war breaks out. And when things start to get bloody, only Adele can step in to protect the family business. Will she get out in time to save Peter? After all, blood is thicker than water, and when family's in trouble you can't look the other way.