FOLK (STEF MACBETH)

Folk was always more than a youth group for Mark: it’s where he belongs, and where the friendships that have made him were forged. Straight talking Anna; beautiful, brilliant Zee; and Seb, who’s in a real band.

But when Gerry, the group’s self-proclaimed ‘thorn in the side of the establishment’ leader tasks him to take a new member under his wing, Mark’s world goes into a spin. Who is this ‘Jason’ guy with his tracksuits, beats and chemical drugs? And why is everyone so in awe of him? Jason just isn’t ‘Folk’. Then a wild camping trip brings Jason’s ‘fresh start’ to an abrupt end – and with it the collapse of Folk. Yet moving on turns out to be complicated.

Set against a backdrop of DIY sound systems and tectonic shifts in society, FOLK is a bittersweet 1990s coming-of-age tale of friendship, fidelity and finding your own path.

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“Folk draws you persuasively and powerfully into the middle 1990s, offering new insights into the freedoms offered by illegal raves and radical youth clubs, told through the lens of an overthinking teenage boy and his friends. I loved it.” Emma Warren (author of Dance Your Way Home: A Journey Through The Dancefloor)

“All hail Stef Macbeth – I’ve been a fan since I read his first word. His inevitable move into fiction is 20 years overdue.” Emily Hill (author of Bad Romance and Love In Late Capitalism)

“Evocative, funny and bittersweet. Macbeth crafts a rave folk tale brimming with Shane Meadows levels of small-town Englishness. Full of dodgy situations, crumbling ideals, first love and finding magic in the mundane, all set to the rising pulse of free rave culture drawing ever closer.” Paul Hanford (author of Coming To Berlin: Global Journeys into an Electronic Music & Club Culture Capital)

Released: 20th June 2025
ISBN: 9781913231934