None of the Cadillacs Was Pink — William Bedford

This book brings together a selection of William Bedford's finest short stories and non-fiction, exploring the experiences behind his first two novels: Happiland (shortlisted for the Guardian prize) and All Shook Up. The short stories appear between two autobiographical essays describing William Bedford's extraordinary life: leaving school at fifteen he worked on the English east coast fish docks and fairgrounds before moving with his family to an American nuclear base in a remote part of Lincolnshire. He trained briefly as a journalist but then joined the police as a cadet, living close to the USAF base during the early years of rock 'n' roll and the anxieties of the Cuban missile crisis. At nineteen, he left Lincolnshire and spent ten years working as a Lloyds Broker in the City of London before becoming an academic and writer.