A Room Above a Shop

And then you've got Patrick's point of view in the late 1950s, telling the story of how they all sort of know each other, how it all began.

What I found really interesting, because obviously I read this straight after reading Room Above a Shop, was that Patrick felt a lot more comfortable with his sexuality than M&B did in A Room Above a Shop.

Yeah, so he's obviously very aware of the dangers.

So his point of view is his diary that he's keeping at the time.

It's not like this is something he finds out later.

He meets him as a policeman.

This is crazy behaviour because it's 1957 you're still 10 years away from homosexuality being decriminalised in England and Wales I did look this up it was actually not until the early 80s that it was decriminalised in Scotland and Northern Ireland so I thought that was interesting but you know we're a decade away from this and this man he knows he can go to prison for being gay and he pursues a policeman so I found that mind-blowing um because when I picked it up I really assumed that it was going to be even more fearful even more secretive even more tense than room above a shop which is you know just post decriminalization although it's set in Wales so it would have been decriminalized in Wales for about 20 years but only just in Northern Ireland and Scotland um It's set at the time that Section 28 comes in.

So obviously that's why Room Above a Shop has all of that tension.