Published: 2014
Reading is essentially about escapism. Novels take us to
exotic, foreign places; to otherworldly paradises or dystopian hells. Brummie Road certainly took me to a
strange and unfamiliar territory – the world of the football fan. And, as many
a fan who has followed their team doggedly through the highs and lows may tell
you, it can be both a heaven and a hell.
I’m not
a football fan myself, and prior to reading this book (which, for the sake of
fairness, I should point out was written by a mate of mine), I knew literally
one fact about West Bromwich Albion – that their ground, The Hawthorns, is the
highest above sea level of any English top-flight club (it really is, I
checked). I’d never heard of Jeff Astle and, as far as I was concerned, The
Three Degrees were a successful trio of R&B singers. So, whilst a story
following the fortunes of the club through the experiences of some of its
supporters would be an obvious recommendation for anyone who’s followed their
team through thick and thin, what about the rest of us?
Written
in a rapid-fire present tense that reflects the eb and flow of everyday life, Brummie Road kicks off (sorry) in 1964.
Billy and ‘Jonah’ Cartwright are just out of school and life revolves around
pubs, music, and above all, standing on the terraces of the Brummie Road end,
where they watch every Albion match they can get to. With the beer flowing,
employment plentiful, and the new trend of singing on the terraces spurring
their team on to victory, it looks like only Billy’s inability to approach that
girl at the bus stop might complicate things. But real life outside of the Bovril
and fag smoke scented oasis of the terraces is destined to intervene. Over the
next four years leading up to Albion’s FA cup victory, the faltering economy
and racial tensions in their local area, combined with complications in their
own lives, mean Billy and Jonah will be left no choice but to face up to the
realities of the world outside their blue-and-white bubble.
West
Brom’s post-1968 glories are akin to looking for several jam jars containing
tea-lights scattered around a rainy field in the middle of the night, so the
second and third parts of the novel hone in on two other periods where the team
were once again making waves: 1978-79, and 1991-94, during which we catch up
with both the central and peripheral characters at different stages in their
lives. For me, Jonah is by far the most interesting character, combining a swaggering,
cocky exterior with an internal honesty about his own myriad inadequacies. In a way, I see him as representing the feel
and spirit of the novel itself: fun and light hearted, to begin with, but with
a darker core that becomes more and more difficult to avoid as the story
progresses. Unfortunately, not all of the central characters are as deeply
developed; we don’t get to know Kath well, for example, she’s more of a vehicle
for bad things to happen to.
Speaking
of the novel’s – and the sport’s – darker
side, football hooliganism is one of the themes dealt with. Without first-hand
experience I cannot honestly say how accurately this is portrayed – especially
because our perceptions of the phenomenon are, even now, so coloured by
probably heavily sensationalised newspaper headlines. That said, Brummie Road isn’t about hooliganism, and certainly doesn’t glamorise it. John King’s
novel The Football Factory said all
that needed to be said about hooliganism in this period, to the extent that it arguably
edged too close to lionising hooligans or glamorising their violence. Richards
works on the assumption that his readers have probably read that novel, and
doesn’t waste time covering the same ground. It’s there, though, as an
unavoidable backdrop. The characters largely eschew the violence themselves,
despite getting caught up in it to varying extents.
Another
issue of the era touched upon is racism and immigration, a topic which provides
some of the novel’s most poignant moments. It negotiates racial issues like a
grimy, Midlands, Bovril-flavoured version of White Teeth. Elsewhere, it effectively juxtaposes humour with
self-awareness, like one character drunkenly attempting to explain the Gulf War
in footballing terms (who hasn’t experienced that moment of clarity, despite
the alcohol, when you realise no-one’s got a clue what you’re trying to
explain?)
For me,
it was one of those books where you finish it, think ‘that was a good laugh’,
or you remember the sweet bits... and then it gradually dawns on you that it
dealt with some heavy themes, but they just snuck by – a bit like real life,
you just get on with it. If it’s really about anything other than the Albion,
then it’s about how people navigate their way through life’s traumas, finding comfort
and escape where they can whilst knowing that, for everyone else, life rumbles
on regardless.
So,
whilst Brummie Road is definitely an
obvious recommendation for any footie fan, past or present, it’s emphatically
not just for them. Bill Shankley
might once have said that whilst some people think football is a matter of life
or death, “I assure you it’s much more serious than that”, Richards knows it’s
not, and so does Brummie Road.
