The red sandstone castle, the town centre in a river horseshoe, the market hall clock tower, and streets such as Mardol… Sounds familiar?

Yes, that’s right. This is Herointown, a backdrop to “All The Dogs”, a debut novel by Shropshire-born author Daniel Bennett.

And before you go leaping to the conclusion that it is actually based on Shrewsbury, Dan wants to get something straight.

Because what he is driving at is that, through the eyes, outlook, and motivations of a druggie, even somewhere as pleasant as Shrewsbury can be reduced to the level of a “Herointown”.

“It’s important to me that people understand that the name ‘Herointown’ is a construct of the main character,” he said.

“Herointown isn’t a substitute name for Shrewsbury, rather it’s the various parts of a man’s surroundings that led him into heroin addiction. ‘Herointown,’ in fact, could be anywhere.

“I can’t stress that strongly enough. That’s one of the tensions in the book, using a place that is attractive and haunting, and having this kind of character with that kind of outlook towards it.

“The idea is that when people are surrounded by the triggers of their compulsive behaviour, any place can become harmful for them. That’s the case with my main character.”

However, because Herointown is loosely modelled on Shrewsbury, Shropshire readers will find much in the book that is familiar.

Indeed, the launch party for the book is in Shrewsbury. It will be on March 13, from 7pm to 9pm, at the Belmont Arts Centre at 5 Belmont, and is open to the public.

On the launch night Dan will be reading from the book, signing copies, and will be in conversation with Luke Brown, editor at Tindal Street Press, the publisher.

“All The Dogs captures perfectly and poetically the beauty of the Shropshire countryside while writing movingly about a town’s social problems,” Luke says.

The publisher’s blurb describes it as having real cult potential – “This 21st century Trainspotting combines the beauty of the Shropshire landscape with the edginess of a community in disarray.”

The book follows the journey of its hero, Monkey, back to his home town after treatment for heroin addiction. He meets old acquaintances and finds himself living in a rural squat, where he is blackmailed into an ecstasy manufacturing racket.

Author Dan, who is 33, lived in London for 10 years, and lives now at Fareham, Hampshire, with his wife and daughter, and has an office job at the London School of Economics in London. But he is a Shropshire lad, having been born in Shrewsbury, where he still has family.

“I lived for ten years in a small village outside of Baschurch (at Old Wood, between Baschurch and Bomere Heath), later moving to Market Drayton.”

On the setting of the book, he says: “With the river, the architecture, the geography of the town, I’ve always found Shrewsbury an attractive, haunting place. And the street names – Dogpole, Bear Steps, Mardol – always sparked something in my imagination. Still, I only lived there for about a year, so there was a sense of distance which allowed me to invent certain aspects.

“The book is partly set in Shrewsbury and it is certainly not my intention to be unflattering towards the town. I find it a haunting, beautiful place, which was partly the attraction of setting the book there.”

There is, he says, little autobiographical in the book, although some parts are loosely based on things that happened to a few friends.

Dan says, probably because he has moved about a lot himself, he is interested in the relationship between people and the places they live.

“The characters are a rootless bunch of people really and when they try to put down roots it doesn’t always work out for them.”

He added: “I’m very interested in the relationship between people and place, and how people can become exiled from their environment. In the same way that the members of the commune are slowly failing in their attempt to live in harmony with the land, so the main character has become estranged from his home because of the therapy to treat his addiction.

“The last thing I want to do is paint Shrewsbury as some kind of urban hell – that would be absurd. That said, these problems are sadly everywhere and, more than buildings and features of geography, people create communities.”

All The Dogs has been seven years in the making, and started off as interconnected short stories about various characters that ended up being in the book.

“The idea was centred around the homecoming of somebody who had been away from the town for some time, and it kind of grew from there.”

All The Dogs has been published by the Birmingham-based Tindal Street Press. It is paperback, ISBN 978- 0-9551384-3-0 and costs £7.99.