FROM SHORELINE TO MAINSTREAM

‘It’s midnight. For you and me at any rate,’ he said, pointing to the side of the mirror… I looked harder and saw the most painful sight yet.

Available October 2003

 From Shoreline to Mainstream is an autobiographical novel that describes the progress of Frank Mack—an unworldly and intense young man, who enters normal education just as he enters adolescence. We follow his experiences as a naively ambitious youngster determined to carve out a life for himself. However, given his unconventional background, Frank soon discovers that life in mainstream education, and with people from social groups he’s had little contact with before, is far removed from the shoreline of his formerly unconventional education and the often-harrowing life he leads on a down-market housing estate in the west of Scotland.

 In the presence of schoolboy caricatures of the world’s greatest thinkers, and of a mysterious boy who is said to have worked a miracle in infancy, Frank ultimately discovers that the life he feels inexorably drawn to, is not the one he was fated to live. And, as he understands the meaning of the choices he’s made in life, he reaches the grim conclusion that we sometimes sacrifice what is dearest to us in order to achieve ambitions of importance only to ourselves.

 At times outrageously funny, at others, deeply moving, From Shoreline to Mainstream portrays the life and times of a reflective young man, whose single-minded determination to explore the mysteries of his existence results in a final revelation that is painful, yet illuminating; horrifying, yet ultimately fulfilling.

 This disarmingly original book will remind you of the frailty of adolescent aspirations, and the perils of self-absorption. It will also infiltrate your emotions relentlessly, and encourage you to ask the sort of questions you’ve been afraid to ask, in case the answers you receive are those you didn’t want to hear.

 A satirical comedy of errors, and a penetrating study of the rite of passage of a youngster in search of his soul, From Shoreline to Mainstream portrays the human condition at its most enigmatic and vulnerable. And as such, it is a rewarding, informative, and often profoundly original read.

 From Shoreline to Mainstream (2003) is published by Xlibris in association with Random House and is available from: www.amazon.co.uk, www.amazon.com, other online booksellers, and major bookstores. ISBN: HC 1-4134-0209-7.  SC 1-4134-0208-9