My publisher sent me this last night and it is definitely worth a read.
This time six years ago the small team that got “Downfall” to market were working at a breakneck pace.
One of the main reasons for our urgency was that my publisher was convinced that there would be a deluge of books on the death of Rangers.
However, our haste was rather in vain.
Downfall remains the only book on the subject written by a journalist.
Consequently, it has become the locus classicus on the death of that football club.
It became a bestseller in Scotland in 2012, despite only being on the shelves from early September.
Folk in the publishing world know that getting book reviews is vital to any sales success.
However, there was only ONE mainstream review of Downfall in Scotland.
You can read it here.
As ever Kevin McKenna didn’t miss:
Three years ago Mac Giolla Bhain began to post blogs about the approaching perfect financial storm that was about to hit Rangers and which would eventually engulf it within two years. If Mac Giolla Bhain had been employed as a staffer on any of Scotland’s dozen or so national newspaper titles he would be a certainty to be crowned sportswriter of the year, news reporter of the year and journalist of the year for his work on the Rangers story. Yet not even the merest hint of his name will be breathed at the annual industry awards bash early next year.
Of course, it should not have been a journalist in another country who was the main chronicler of the death of Rangers.
Scottish based journalists who should have put their stamp on that story instead decided that it was safer to pretend that it didn’t happen at all!
Consequently, their coverage of the Sevco shitshow since then has been even more shameful and cowardly than their many failures over the Rangers story.
Perhaps they looked at what happens to anyone who would dare tell the truth about what happened at Ibrox.
Everyone probably knows about the Salman Rushdie Satanic Verses controversy.
However, only a few within the publishing world would know the identity of the book editor.
Yet the person who fulfilled that vital role in getting Downfall to market was deemed a legitimate target for the klan.
Thankfully, Angela Haggerty had her day in court and Mr David Limond of the “Rangers Chat” podcast received six months in prison for his hate crimes.
People tend to reveal their true character under pressure and Ms Haggerty quietly demonstrated that she is made of the right stuff.
Much to the chagrin of the klan she hasn’t gone away you know.
Angela is now a national newspaper columnist and a regular media commentator in various TV studios in the UK.
Of course, she should never have been a target for The People, but she was.
The entire saga around Downfall convinced me of the ugly amorality of the Ibrox klanbase and the cowardice of those on the sports desks.
Consequently, I couldn’t Do Walking Away from reporting on what was happening at Ibrox after 2012.
The Sevco freak show has produced a dazzling array of bizarre characters, from Charles of Normandy to the Convict Chairman.
However, the chaps on the sports desks have been craven throughout and have observed the stenography protocols.
Not all journalists failed to step up about the Rangers saga.
Those out with Fair Caledonia saw the significance of the Ibrox story.
I was honoured that a journalist of the standing of Alex Thomson of Channel 4 News would agree to write the foreword.
“A tale of our times, brilliantly told”.
Many thanks Alex!
Despite an all-out effort by the klan, the bookshops in Glasgow never did refuse to take a bestselling book that had local interest.
It is still on sale, still in print.
It was good that the klan failed in their censorious quest.
Books being banned is a canary down the mine in any free society and is something worth remembering.
