I don't admire the violence and, despite having grown up in a very violent town and had my fair share of bovva as a teenager (punk in town full of mods) I cannot now identify at all with the desire or even ability to inflict pain and injury on another human being. More particularly, lower-class males tend to develop a violent and aggressive habitus and mode of presenting themselves to the world more frequently than do males in the classes above them.

The book reminded me of an old Groucho Marx quote: "From the moment I picked it up to the moment I put it down again, I was convulsed with laughter. All of our food dishes were absolutely beautifully cooked and lovely presented and not long to wait either. I refer to my good friend John who's a martial arts teacher in japan, who once said, "you should appeal to your opponent's sense of honour and self-respect. The bottom line is that nothing much ever happens, but these muppets spend a lot of cash so while nothing is happening they look the part.The book, which has sold about 120,000 copies, claims he does not seek to glorify violence, but capture the "spirit of the times". Most martial arts rely on specific styles that need a lot of practice to perfect and also a lot of "nerve and experience" to use against a big lad intent on giving you a kicking. But when it came to figuring out how the rebellion, and the rebels in it, would behave in Flames Of Rebellion, and thus Rebellion’s Fury, were you more inspired by real-life rebellions or fictional ones?

He soon met Bob Carmichael, a former firm member and offshore worker who had been a part of the casuals for around two decades. The brothers gave up hooliganism after Dougie suffered two broken ribs and Eddy's skull was fractured during a weekend of fighting. But then I decided there were just too many things I wanted to do, and they wouldn’t always fit that well into the same reality. It’s hard to imagine that the American Revolution, for example, could have succeeded without an ocean between it and Britain. Bloody casuals was so good because it didn't stretch the truth like so many books in this genre, I was present at almost all the events in the book (outwith the prison chapter ) and can vouch for Jay, legend of his time, from the casuals through to his raves, everything was always done with a touch of class.

I tend to like to explore motivations of characters, and one thing I really wanted to do was have some of the rebels conflicted, torn between angst at the government’s brutality, but discomfort with going all the way and rebelling against it.