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Making a Difference
The novel is set in a fictional northern town and tells how Greg Preston, Mister Average in his mid-thirties with a wife and two children becomes radicalised, not by a Jihadist or religious group but by an extreme left wing anti-capitalist movement.
It starts with the funeral of Greg’s younger brother Allan who committed suicide in prison having been convicted of possession of a firearm that he was moving on behalf of the Movement. Allan had quit university in London, disillusioned by the inequality of life and had lost touch with his family who only discovered he was back in the area when he was arrested in a nearby town.
The funeral is the starting point for Greg’s desire to find answers as to why his brother took the decisions he did and what ultimately drove him to suicide.
Greg had already been identified as a potential recruit by the Movement and when they become aware of his quest they approach him and offer to give him some of his answers. He agrees and this is the start of a process of subtle manipulation by members of the movement who play on his feelings for his dead brother and, combined with other events, steadily draw him towards them.
Greg has to conceal his covert meetings with the members of the movement from his wife and this creates major problems between them until eventually he begins to reveal what he has been doing although he never tells her everything. The novel ends in a dramatic climax with a number of twists concerning various characters.
It starts with the funeral of Greg’s younger brother Allan who committed suicide in prison having been convicted of possession of a firearm that he was moving on behalf of the Movement. Allan had quit university in London, disillusioned by the inequality of life and had lost touch with his family who only discovered he was back in the area when he was arrested in a nearby town.
The funeral is the starting point for Greg’s desire to find answers as to why his brother took the decisions he did and what ultimately drove him to suicide.
Greg had already been identified as a potential recruit by the Movement and when they become aware of his quest they approach him and offer to give him some of his answers. He agrees and this is the start of a process of subtle manipulation by members of the movement who play on his feelings for his dead brother and, combined with other events, steadily draw him towards them.
Greg has to conceal his covert meetings with the members of the movement from his wife and this creates major problems between them until eventually he begins to reveal what he has been doing although he never tells her everything. The novel ends in a dramatic climax with a number of twists concerning various characters.
Hardcover
Published January 1, 1996
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