Galahad is getting on well in London.

In fact he sometimes feels like a king as he strolls through the park, three or four pounds in his pocket, sharp clothes on, off to meet a new girl under the clock in Piccadilly tube station.

But there's a darker side to the city, and a hungrier one, that prompts Galahad into a high-risk exploit.

Sam Selvon's rich and touching 1956 novel about the lives of a group of Caribbean immigrants in London.

Abridged by Lauris Morgan-Griffiths.

Read by Don Warrington.

Producer: Sara Davies

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in January 2014.

*** THE LONELY LONDONERS will be followed on 4 Extra by Colin MacInnes's vibrant novel about London, ABSOLUTE BEGINNERS, set just a couple of years later as racial tensions rise.

Together, the two books offer an unforgettable portrait of a city and a society undergoing convulsive change. Show less