I don’t read a lot of fiction, but I’ve had time for Tony White ever since I saw him read from his novel “Charlieunclenorfolktango” above a pub somewhere in Farringdon in the mid 90s. He would have been on the same bill as either Stewart Home or some of the Attack! Books writers, or both – because those are the only literary events I was going to at that time.

I guess one of the reasons I like his work is that it covers similar ground to many of my obsessions – the London of squats and raves, industrial culture, reggae, slang. Tony’s Piece of Paper Press site is great place to get lost as part of your procrastination strategies.

He has just published “A Porky Prime Cut” – an ebook which covers a fictional teenager growing up and getting into 70s reggae, William Burroughs, and Throbbing Gristle – the latter’s logo becoming an unlikely totem…

The text conjurs up some heady memories for me – growing up in the south (St Albans for me, a lash up of Bournemouth and Poole for the fictional protagonist) and getting into all sorts of weirdness, as well as the violence from others this entails in small town England.

You can download A Porky Prime Cut for free here. It’s in “epub” format so you might need to download a (free) utility to read it – but that’s pretty straightforward and is all explained here.

Tony has performed a reading of “A Porky Prime Cut” recently at the National Portrait Gallery, and has posted an mp3 on his blog.

I would also thoroughly recommend Tony’s blog post on “street talk” scare stories from last year. And his other books, of course.