City author wants classic novel to be turned into 'next Coronation Street'

Apr 5 2012 By Emma Smith

A GLASGOW author has revealed that she hopes her novel about working class families in the city will be made into a TV series.

Margaret Thomson Davis, 86, had her book The Breadmakers Saga – which has been compared with Coronation Street – first published in 1972.

But it has been relaunched again four decades later because of popular demand.

The novel follows the story of a Glasgow working class community living through the dark days of the Depression and World War II.

It has an array of colourful characters such as Catriona, who is struggling to cope with an overbearing husband, the foreman baker Baldy Fowler and his tragic wife Sarah, and other members of a Glasgow
neighbourhood who face up to the challenges of everyday life.

It has been called a “Glaswegian equivalent of Coronation Street” and Margaret, 86, has revealed how happy it would make her if someone made it into a film or TV series.

The former Red Cross nurse said: “So many people who have read and enjoyed the book have said to me that it would be fantastic if was made into a TV series.

“I would be over the moon if it happened second time round after the book is relaunched.

“I think it would be really appealing to Scottish people as it’s about ordinary people who live in a Glaswegian tenement. They would be able to relate to a lot of the stories.

“I love Glasgow – I get so much inspiration from the city. I used to travel a lot on the buses in the city and I would listen into other people’s conversations to get ideas for my book.”

The talented author originally wrote books that were about rich people living in the country – but they were always rejected.

But she met best-selling author Alexander Cordell at a writers’ conference and he told her to write about what she knew.

She added: “Having grown up in Glasgow tenements that was what I knew best. The Breadmakers Saga was my debut novel and I’m still very proud of it.

“Now I have wealthy friends who invite me to their big houses and I have been all over the world.”

Her other books include The Clydesiders Trilogy, The Tobacco Lords, A Deadly Deception and Goodman of Glassford Street.