One of the leading masters of British noir, David Peace, admits that his interest in crime fiction was sparked by the sinister events that took place in his native Yorkshire - from 1975 to 1981, the local population lived in fear of the elusive serial killer - the Yorkshire Ripper. It was these events that served as the reason for the creation of the tetralogy “Yorkshire Quartet”, or “Red Riding” (a riding is a unit of administrative-territorial division of the county of Yorkshire), which brought Peace worldwide fame. “1974” is the first volume of the tetralogy “Yorkshire Quartet”.

1974. The Irish Republican Army carries out a series of bombings in London. Ian Ball makes an unsuccessful attempt to kidnap Princess Anne. Far-right National Front members march through the West End. Songs from the Bay City Rollers are all the rage. The ninth Bond film “The Man with the Golden Gun” with Roger Moore and “Murder on the Orient Express” based on the novel by Agatha Christie are being released in Yorkshire, England. Yorkshire Post crime correspondent Edward Dunford is assigned to write about the investigation into the mysterious disappearance of a ten-year-old girl. When she is found brutally murdered, Dunford undertakes her own investigation into the sinister crimes that took place in Yorkshire. The more questions he asks, the deeper he plunges into the nightmarish secrets of human perversions and vices, which extend to the highest echelons of power and go into the very “heart of darkness” of the English countryside.