This book on Liverpool offers the reader many things: a comprehensive social and cultural history; an insider travel guide; an analysis of the city s people and the places they inhabit; the gripping tale of the Beatles in their Liverpool home and an evaluation of the music that preceded their rise and followed their demise in 1970. An inside view of the Scouser s unbreakable bond with his football team and the pub completes the picture. Neil Deane weaves in his own story after joining the proceedings in 1957, relating his everyday experience of life in his home town until his departure in 1979, after which he continues his autobiographical narrative as a self-exiled, committed observer and frequent visitor. He attempts to explain how and why Liverpool is a city on the edge , different from its northern neighbours, misunderstood and even reviled by sections of the southern establishment, and too often making the headlines for all the wrong reasons. Sweeping away lazy clichés, he aims to get the reader that bit closer to the truth. The book is not a typical tourist guide, more an authentic tale told with love and passion, a personal odyssey with heaven and hell present in equal proportions; however, his final message of optimism is that any stranger visiting Liverpool will be uplifted most of all by its people, ever determined to make sure that heaven wins the penalty shoot-out.