Jim Sweetman writes...

Written under the name Jim Sebastian, this novel is about four couples who live in a new and expanding town on the outskirts of London and one week in their lives sometime in the mid-1970s.

The story focuses on their relationships and interconnections and has something to say about how the permissive society of the 1960s found broader expression in the 1970s. These characters, between the ages of twenty-five and forty are working out what it all means.

So, you'll find adultery - condoned and secretive, sex in the working environment, a nod towards porn and Masters and Johnson, and a party that gets out of hand when one of the guests turns up with some hash cakes. But, you'll also find the new town experience, something about women in business and a hint of organised crime and corruption without a mobile phone in sight.

The episodic, day by day, structure of the book and plenty of nicely written dialogue would help to make engaging television or film.

“We don't know the days that will change our lives. Probably just as well.” Stephen King

Alison Clinton thinks that she has a normal, everyday sort of life in the late 1970s but a health scare and a series of unexpected events precipitate her into a chaotic world. Within days she finds out that a husband is having an affair with her best friend, she meets someone by chance, he is murdered, her husband's company is involved, there are drug smugglers, the police are corrupt and her life unravels before her eyes.

I wanted to write a book set in a time before mobile phones and social media with a reluctant central character who has to find out as much about herself as she does about what she thought was her life.

Here's a taster from the start of the novel!

Meet the Folks

Here's a pastiche of those old 1970's sex magazines featuring one of the couples from novel!

The Eldridges At Home

Just a normal Monday. This is Alison's family before the chaos!

Monday Morning!

A mother puts her children first. As things go from bad to worse, Alison, helped by a friend, has to check on her kids who are at the Safari Park with her parents.

The Safari Park