From the author of ‘Saturday Night and Sunday Morning’ come stories of hardship and hope in post-war Britain.

The title story in this classic collection tells of Smith, a defiant young rebel, inhabiting the no-man's land of institutionalised Borstal. As his steady jog-trot rhythm transports him over an unrelenting, frost-bitten earth, he wonders why, for whom and for what he is running.

A groundbreaking work, ‘The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner’ captured the grim isolation of the working class in the English Midlands when it was first published in 1960s. But Sillitoe’s depiction of petty crime and deep-seated anger in industrial and desperate cities remains as potent today as it was almost half a century ago.

“When I think of the phrase Making it Happen, I always think of the adversity you inevitably face and the determination needed to stand up for something you believe in. The prose in this story is to me about the youthful spirit, and sometimes understanding that its okay to go on certain journeys alone.”
— Abbey Odunlami

This title is also available as a book and ebook from Barking & Dagenham Libraries