It is 1996. Teenage Alex languishes in his garage den smoking weed, imagining a future of travel and sunshine between completing chores set by his mother. The date is set, the only hurdle is cash. While mowing the front lawn he meets double-glazing salesman, Fox, and lands a job as a canvasser for Baston Window company.
Money issues and empty days are over. Alex gets sucked into the business of knocking on doors and daytime drinking, nights out in seedy pubs with Fox, corrupt boss, Harold, and the rest of the sales team, while falling for beautiful, aloof, Brigitte, in the telesales department.
Before long, Alex is lured into crime, his finances are depleting and he’s sleeping on a sofa in a shabby flat with fellow canvassers, James and Kevin. He’s too caught up in his undeclared obsession with Brigitte to meet another girl, and his old friends have moved on. It’s time to leave the tangle of this new life, but pending sales and Brigitte make it harder than he thought.
A classic coming of age tale in the cheap but flashy world of double glazing, Windows 96 is an amusing, yet insightful look into not only the character’s lives, but human nature. Readers who miss the buzzing vibe of the nineties, as well as those who enjoy well-written character-driven stories, will follow Alex on his road of good intentions until the final page.
