Eamonn McCann's account of what it is like to grow up a Catholic in a Northern Irish ghetto was first published in 1974. It quickly became a recognised as a classic account of the feelings generated by British rule. The author was at the centre of events in Derry which first brought Northern Ireland to world attention.

He witnessed the gradual transformation of the civil rights movement from a mild campaign for 'British Democracy' to an all-out military assault on the British state. This new edition updates the last edition (1980) with an additional introduction covering the last thirteen years.

War and an Irish Town is a trenchant, powerful narrative which reaches an unequivocal conclusion: 'There can be no internal solution to the Northern Ireland problem. The existence of the northern state is the problem'.