You can’t choose your mum and dad, even when they choose you.

In my early teens I had a taste for horror comics. In one strip I read of a handsome young couple at last alone in their honeymoon suite. He is crisply suited, clean-cut. She, lovely in her wedding finery, offers him the chance to watch her disrobe.

The bride is not shy. She reveals herself, frame by frame, to be a hideous crone gloating at having tricked her new husband. He is unfazed, setting her to screaming as he removes his own head to stow it, grinning still, under his arm. Years later, when I thought of writing a memoir or fictionalised account of my parents’ marriage, the title I toyed with was ‘The Hag and the Head’.

If this gripping narration of a 1960s Fenland boyhood sometimes reads like fiction, the detailed evocation of characters and events, by turns humorous and traumatic, anchors it in remembered facts. The author does not soft-pedal the dysfunction at the core of a wide, supportive family in which the boy faces adult challenges, including jarring discoveries about his parents’ separate and shared history.

Visit www.davidgbailey.com and author Facebook page at bit.ly/D-G-B

DAVID G BAILEY’s debut publication in 2021 was Seventeen, a football fantasy adventure novel aimed at and beyond young adults. Them Roper Girls (2022) returned to a world more recognisably our own, tracing in their own voices the lives of four sisters over more than sixty years from their 1950s childhood. A husband of a Roper sister takes centre stage in Them Feltwell Boys (2023). With the same gritty realism and sometimes dark humour found in its predecessor, this follows Ray Roden’s crude attempts at teenage love in counterpoint to his cynical womanising as an adult. The Sunny Side of the House (2024) is a first venture into non-fiction in another projected series, When Life Gives You Strawberries – Memories of a Fenland Boy. The origin story of Seventeen appears within the clear-eyed narrative of a 1960s boyhood in East Anglia, where both David’s contemporary novels are partly set. He currently lives in the Midlands.

To read more of and about David’s work, including a quarterly newsletter and new content daily comprising extracts from diaries and other writing over more than fifty years, visit his website www.davidgbailey.com.

Amazon 5-Star Reviews

‘If you’re ready to dive into a whirlwind of humor, heartache, and childhood revelations, then The Sunny Side of the House is your golden ticket! David G. Bailey whisked me away on a time-traveling adventure to the 1960s Fenland, and boy, what a ride it was!
Laura @bookishhermit

‘The story is beautifully paced, shaped and controlled. Even with a cast of thousands, I managed to work out who was who and I really wasn’t expecting the revelations of the last chapter, congratulations for unveiling it so poignantly yet providing the answer to the puzzle that underlies most of the volume.’
Revd Canon Colin Gough

‘from the first page I was immediately drawn into the wit and wisdom of the author… an emotional rollercoaster ride, one moment I find myself laughing out loud and in the next breath I find my heart aching. It really is a lovely book, of growing up in the 1960s and then navigating through life.’
Kerry @redhead_reviews1

'Bailey’s writing is as sharp as it is lyrical, and he doesn’t shy away from the hard realities of family dynamics, offering a poignant, nuanced view of growing up in the Sixties. If you enjoy stories that weave together personal growth, family secrets, and a strong sense of place, Sunny Side of the House is an unforgettable read. Highly recommended!’
Helen @bookoclock

‘This is the first book that I have read by the author and I will definitely be reading more by him. The author’s writing is beautiful and the pacing was just right. Even though there were some sensitive subjects in the book, the author handled these with care. This was such a beautiful book, I highly recommend it to other readers.’
Emma @emmas_wellbeing_page