We didn't mean to start a legend - we just wanted to grow a few plants where no one would ever think to look.
Under the streets of Edinburgh, in the dead space behind a fake washing machine and a rusted service door, The Dude and his crew build the kind of grow room most people only talk about when they're properly stoned.
On paper, the plan is simple:
a forgotten room in a city-centre car park, a few lights, some hydro buckets and a handful of carefully chosen ladies. No guns. No gangs. No wannabe cartel posturing. Just weed, engineering and a healthy disrespect for the rules.
In reality?
It's traffic cops and bomb squads, coke habits and dodgy mates, Triad "accountants", Tartan Army away days, guardian-angel near misses and the constant sense that one tiny mistake could send everything crashing down.
Underground Legends follows The Dude - Glasgow born, Edinburgh sharpened - as he tries to:
run a secret grow right under the noses of the city,
keep his friends alive, mostly out of jail and occasionally off the rails,
juggle club nights, five-a-side, European football trips and rock-gig backstage passes,
all while trying not to become famous for the one thing he absolutely does not want to get caught doing.
It's not a rags-to-riches fantasy. There's no mansion at the end, no cartel throne, no Hollywood shoot-outs. This is low-key crime: small crews, big nerves, and a very real sense that the system is mad enough to lock you up for a plant while turning a blind eye to worse.
Told in The Dude's own voice - funny, sharp, occasionally furious and surprisingly philosophical - Underground Legends is:
a love letter to Scottish club culture and city life,
a sideways look at "victimless crime" and weed politics,
and a story about loyalty, karma and the kind of close shaves you only get when you spend too long dancing on the edge.
You'll meet:
Gibby, a chaotic rock-star dealer with a medical file to match his legend.
Star, Ped, Rubber, The Dook, Gianni and the rest of the unofficial brotherhood.
Cops who can't decide if it's "your lucky day", random heroes who appear at exactly the right time, and bullies who learn - painfully - that some people bite back.
If you've ever:
loved a good heist story but wished it felt more like real life,
argued that weed laws are insane,
spent nights in clubs, festival fields or away-day terraces collecting ridiculous stories with your mates,
then this is your kind of book.
Underground Legends: A Novel of Weed, Karma and Close Shaves is for readers who like their crime fiction:
gritty but not grim,
funny but not daft,
thoughtful without ever getting preachy,
and laced with a lot of swearing, a bit of philosophy and a stubborn belief that being a "good guy" and being "a criminal" aren't always opposites.
The grow might be hidden. The names might be changed.
But the heart, the humour and the close calls? Those are absolutely real where it counts.
Step into Room 33. Just watch your back... and your karma.
