Seasons in the Sun

SEASONS IN THE SUN

The Battle for Britain, 1974-1979

DOMINIC SANDBROOK

To be published by Allen Lane, 19th April 2012, £30

Dominic Sandbrook is starring in a major new BBC2 documentary series, The Seventies.

To air from 17th April for four weeks

Seasons in the Sun is the gloriously colourful new book by Dominic Sandbrook, the acclaimed author ofNever Had It So Good, White Heat and State of Emergency, revealing how the late Seventies was the decisive point in the creation of modern Britain.

In the mid-1970s, Britain’s fortunes seemed to have reached their lowest point since the Blitz. As inflation rocketed, the pound collapsed and car bombs exploded across London, as the Treasury went cap in hand to the IMF and the Sex Pistols stormed their way to notoriety, it seemed like the game was up for an exhausted nation.

Seasons in the Sun is a dramatic, vivid and gripping book about this extraordinary period in all its chaos and contradiction. Across the country, a profound argument about the future of the nation was being played out, not just in families and schools but in everything from episodes of Doctor Who to singles by the Clash. As the changes and the turmoil of the previous decades played itself out, these years saw the peak of trade union power and the apogee of an old working-class Britain – but also the birth of home computers, New Wave, nudity on TV, the rise of the ready meal and the triumph of the Grantham grocer’s daughter who would change our fortunes forever.

Praise for State of Emergency:

“Superb…vivid…magnificent…Anyone who was there should read it: and so should anyone who was not”

Simon Heffer, Literary Review

“Thrillingly panoramic…he vividly recreates the texture of everyday life in a thousand telling details”

Francis Wheen, Observer

“Hugely entertaining, always compelling, often hilarious”

Simon Sebag Monetfiore, Sunday Telegraph

Born in Shropshire ten days before the October 1974 election, Dominic Sandbrook was educated at Oxford, St Andrews and Cambridge. He is the author of three hugely acclaimed books on post-war Britain, as well as two books on modern American history, Eugene McCarthy and Mad as Hell. A prolific reviewer and columnist, he writes regularly for the Sunday Times, Daily Mail, New Statesman and BBC History.

Press contact: Mari Yamazaki / 020 7010 3419 / mari.yamazaki@uk.penguingroup.com