Dear TVC readers

OK, here's the deal. Where Did It All Go Right?, the first volume of my light-hearted memoirs, might have been the only volume had very few people taken any interest in my ordinary, provincial 1970s upbringing. However, it seemed to strike a chord of universal truth (not least with people who specifically pass through those little branches of WHSmith in railway stations and airports!) and my publishers duly packed me back off to the past in order to dredge up a sequel.

The first book ended when, aged 19, I left home for London and that's pretty much where Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now picks up. It covers my student years and, neatly, the larger part of the 80s. I may as well warn you now, it involves me having sex - something which has frightened the horses up at TVC Towers where the resolutely rumpo-free books of McGown and Currie dominate the library - but it's not about sex. It's about growing up. And I don't just mean the growing up you do in your early teens, when Lego loses its appeal (even the technical sets) in favour of going to discos. We're talking about the bit at the end of your teens when you start to take stock of who you are, decide who to vote for and buy your own mince.

In the process of writing HKIMN - a sometimes painful one - my editor and I threw out a lot of stuff that wasn't needed on the voyage. We decided against any more WDIAGR-style diary entries as they were just too obtuse. We also rejected the idea of running my letters home. (Of course my Mum and Dad kept them!) Rigorously annotated, these would have formed buffers between the chapters, except we decided they slowed the action down.

What you are about to read are a handful of those letters. In annotating them for TVC, I have tried to make them work in isolation from the book, which you may have no intention yet of buying and that is your democratic right.

All you need to know is: I'm 19 in 1984 when they begin, I'm living in Ralph West Hall of Residence in Battersea, fighting off homesickness, attending Chelsea School Of Art and wishing for the most part that I had a nice girlfriend.
It's not Kenneth Williams or TS Eliot, but you might just see a bit of yourself in there. Or at least laugh at my desperation to paint a less than vulgar picture for my parents back in Northampton.

Thank you for listening.