At the end of the 1970s, Harvey Mudd is a lazy, cynical journalist, writing stories simply to please his conservative editor and the equally right-wing woman in his life—his mother. But as the Winter of Discontent, when 'Labour Isn't Working', draws to an end and the country smiles desperately in the direction of its first female Prime Minister, Harvey is forced onto the frontline of propaganda warfare and the decade that follows shapes his life into a quest for the most elusive commodity of the times—the truth.

Harvey is placed in the centre of the titanic feud between the Thatcher Government and the National Union of Mineworkers, covering all the action with enough spin to stir up hate for the miners' plight. However, as he watches the death of British industry, riots, strikes and bombings, and is allowed snapshots into the crumbling communities and personal stories of those affected, his battle extends beyond the stirrings of his own working-class roots. The tug of war between socialism and capitalism is dangerously overflowing into communism and fascism and he starts to wonder if either side really cares if the people it represents are completely destroyed.

Robert Mercer-Nairne is the author of three novels, The Letter Writer, Like No Other and Warlord, two collections of poetry, Mercer-Nairne in Malta and On Fire, and the non-fiction Notes on the Dynamics of Man. He lives in Scotland.