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Which Book Are You Reading thread

Speaking of Edinburgh as a backdrop, my favourite author of the last 30 years is definitely Irvine Welsh. Some of his last books were disappointing, but the first few were absolute masterpieces.

Especially Trainspotting; Acid House; Ecstasy; Filth; Glue; Porno
 
Football us life said:
Yep. The Rebus serie is outstanding crime fiction...

And I do like a brooding, cynical, chain smoking and bodering alcoholic detective!!

With Edinburgh being my favourite, maybe second favourite city in the world... and far more than just a backdrop in Rebus. It's essentially a living character in the series. Rankin contrasts the city's elegant, historic, tourist-friendly surface with its gritty, shadowy underbelly of poverty, violence, and all that hidden corruption....

Ian Rankin and his Tartan Noir.. Brilliance personified!!
Click to expand...
Football us life said:
Yep. The Rebus serie is outstanding crime fiction...

And I do like a brooding, cynical, chain smoking and bodering alcoholic detective!!

With Edinburgh being my favourite, maybe second favourite city in the world... and far more than just a backdrop in Rebus. It's essentially a living character in the series. Rankin contrasts the city's elegant, historic, tourist-friendly surface with its gritty, shadowy underbelly of poverty, violence, and all that hidden corruption....

Ian Rankin and his Tartan Noir.. Brilliance personified!!
Click to expand...
Must admit, I love Edinburgh - the setting.
 
Mr Cleansheets said:
Speaking of Edinburgh as a backdrop, my favourite author of the last 30 years is definitely Irvine Welsh. Some of his last books were disappointing, but the first few were absolute masterpieces.

Especially Trainspotting; Acid House; Ecstasy; Filth; Glue; Porno
Click to expand...

I've always thought of Irvine Welsh as the Scottish 'Charles Dickens'....

Both authors use fiction to expose societal neglect - Dickens on poverty, child labour, and class rigidity..... Welsh on Thatcher-era/post-industrial decay, heroin epidemics, and disenfranchised youth....

Welsh writes primarily in Scottish working class vernacular which can feel as distinctive and challenging to outsiders as Dickens's phonetic Cockney slang.

Although Welshie is a bit more explicit in his writing but that's the modern Scottish urban grit!!
 
Football us life said:
I've always thought of Irvine Welsh as the Scottish 'Charles Dickens'....

Both authors use fiction to expose societal neglect - Dickens on poverty, child labour, and class rigidity..... Welsh on Thatcher-era/post-industrial decay, heroin epidemics, and disenfranchised youth....

Welsh writes primarily in Scottish working class vernacular which can feel as distinctive and challenging to outsiders as Dickens's phonetic Cockney slang.

Although Welshie is a bit more explicit in his writing but that's the modern Scottish urban grit!!
Click to expand...
Scottish Charles Dickens ... interesting idea.

Some years ago I was commissioned by the NSW Writers' Centre to write a piece for their Writer on Writer series, so I chose Irvine Welsh. Here is my article for those interested in IW:


IRVINE WELSH by Adrian Deans​

I was working in London, in 1995, when I first became aware of Irvine Welsh. The movie Trainspotting was about to come out and was being flogged shamelessly on the Underground, and just about everywhere else.

Sometimes you can just about tell in advance when a watershed is about to hit. There was a strange, compelling magic to the movie posters which proclaimed difference – which demanded attention – which said: “Miss this, and your relevant life is over.”

Of course, to the cognoscenti in 1995, Irvine Welsh was old news. Trainspotting had been famously described in 1992 by Rebel Inc as: “The greatest book ever written by man or woman...deserves to sell more copies than the Bible.” But it was new to me, and that English summer I discovered my favourite writer since Orwell.

I must have read Trainspotting about 20 times – The Acid House about 10 – Porno probably five or six – Filth, Glue and Ecstasy at least twice and the rest just once. There are times, for me, when nothing will serve but Irvine Welsh and I can go weeks reading nothing else.

Why?

All great writers, I believe, explore the human condition through their own peculiar prism, and for Irvine Welsh that prism is the world of the Edinburgh junkies, schemies and wide-os, where moral decay is worn on the sleeve like a VC stolen from your best mate’s grandad and sold for drugs.

So where’s the honour? Where’s the uplifting hero’s journey – the character arc taking Renton, Sickboy, Juice Terry or Begbie to an acceptable redemption after a harrowing tale of disentitlement and oppression?

There is no honour. There is only survival, with morality featuring merely as a collateral victim in the psychopathic carnage of story.

Irvine Welsh takes his readers beyond the middle class axiom that all people are fundamentally decent and will do-the-right-thing-if-given-half-a-chance-by-an-uncaring-society. Irvine Welsh’s characters are not fundamentally decent. They are cold, selfish, hedonistic, murderous cunts, who somehow manage to be hilariously funny and can give the bourgeois reader profound insights into the human condition, which he or she will never get reading Joyce, Proust, Konrad, Heller, Golding or even (dare I say it) Orwell.

And he’s not afraid to tamper with established writing conventions. Trainspotting and Porno are both told as multiple first-person narratives – and he doesn’t even bother making it plain who is speaking! The reader must work it out for him/herself and it sometimes takes a while, but the reward is that you are inside the heads and privy to the hopes, fears, motivations, petty spites and idle fancies of the main characters. Done badly, this would be a turgid, unreadable mess. Done well, the reading experience is like watching (and hearing) a vivid movie inside your own head.

A common criticism of Irvine Welsh is the difficulty some have with his phonetic style which is designed to give the reader access to the authentic sounds and rhythms of the Edinburgh dialect.

I love it.

Sure, it takes a bit of work, but once you “get it” you really are transported into the guts of the story and feel it intensely like you feel (for example) Anthony Burgess’s A Clockwork Orange – which employs similar linguistic devices and traverses similar socio-moral territory.

My one regret regarding Irvine is this – his best work was his earliest work. His most recent works have been derivative – even forgettable. To compare him with my number one hero, Orwell grew as a writer – taking giant steps in the 1940s and culminating with his masterpiece, 1984, which was published only five weeks before his death.

Having said that, Orwell had a mid-career slump (Coming Up for Air; A Clergyman’s Daughter anyone?) so who knows what might lie ahead for Irvine Welsh?

I understand that he is currently writing Skagboys – a prequel to Trainspotting – which I hope and pray will take us back to his original muse – or somewhere harrowing, better and different once again.
 
Mr Cleansheets said:
Scottish Charles Dickens ... interesting idea.

Some years ago I was commissioned by the NSW Writers' Centre to write a piece for their Writer on Writer series, so I chose Irvine Welsh. Here is my article for those interested in IW:


IRVINE WELSH by Adrian Deans​

I was working in London, in 1995, when I first became aware of Irvine Welsh. The movie Trainspotting was about to come out and was being flogged shamelessly on the Underground, and just about everywhere else.

Sometimes you can just about tell in advance when a watershed is about to hit. There was a strange, compelling magic to the movie posters which proclaimed difference – which demanded attention – which said: “Miss this, and your relevant life is over.”

Of course, to the cognoscenti in 1995, Irvine Welsh was old news. Trainspotting had been famously described in 1992 by Rebel Inc as: “The greatest book ever written by man or woman...deserves to sell more copies than the Bible.” But it was new to me, and that English summer I discovered my favourite writer since Orwell.

I must have read Trainspotting about 20 times – The Acid House about 10 – Porno probably five or six – Filth, Glue and Ecstasy at least twice and the rest just once. There are times, for me, when nothing will serve but Irvine Welsh and I can go weeks reading nothing else.

Why?

All great writers, I believe, explore the human condition through their own peculiar prism, and for Irvine Welsh that prism is the world of the Edinburgh junkies, schemies and wide-os, where moral decay is worn on the sleeve like a VC stolen from your best mate’s grandad and sold for drugs.

So where’s the honour? Where’s the uplifting hero’s journey – the character arc taking Renton, Sickboy, Juice Terry or Begbie to an acceptable redemption after a harrowing tale of disentitlement and oppression?

There is no honour. There is only survival, with morality featuring merely as a collateral victim in the psychopathic carnage of story.

Irvine Welsh takes his readers beyond the middle class axiom that all people are fundamentally decent and will do-the-right-thing-if-given-half-a-chance-by-an-uncaring-society. Irvine Welsh’s characters are not fundamentally decent. They are cold, selfish, hedonistic, murderous cunts, who somehow manage to be hilariously funny and can give the bourgeois reader profound insights into the human condition, which he or she will never get reading Joyce, Proust, Konrad, Heller, Golding or even (dare I say it) Orwell.

And he’s not afraid to tamper with established writing conventions. Trainspotting and Porno are both told as multiple first-person narratives – and he doesn’t even bother making it plain who is speaking! The reader must work it out for him/herself and it sometimes takes a while, but the reward is that you are inside the heads and privy to the hopes, fears, motivations, petty spites and idle fancies of the main characters. Done badly, this would be a turgid, unreadable mess. Done well, the reading experience is like watching (and hearing) a vivid movie inside your own head.

A common criticism of Irvine Welsh is the difficulty some have with his phonetic style which is designed to give the reader access to the authentic sounds and rhythms of the Edinburgh dialect.

I love it.

Sure, it takes a bit of work, but once you “get it” you really are transported into the guts of the story and feel it intensely like you feel (for example) Anthony Burgess’s A Clockwork Orange – which employs similar linguistic devices and traverses similar socio-moral territory.

My one regret regarding Irvine is this – his best work was his earliest work. His most recent works have been derivative – even forgettable. To compare him with my number one hero, Orwell grew as a writer – taking giant steps in the 1940s and culminating with his masterpiece, 1984, which was published only five weeks before his death.

Having said that, Orwell had a mid-career slump (Coming Up for Air; A Clergyman’s Daughter anyone?) so who knows what might lie ahead for Irvine Welsh?

I understand that he is currently writing Skagboys – a prequel to Trainspotting – which I hope and pray will take us back to his original muse – or somewhere harrowing, better and different once again.
Click to expand...
cracking piece..... nicely done :)
 
Mr Cleansheets said:
Scottish Charles Dickens ... interesting idea.

Some years ago I was commissioned by the NSW Writers' Centre to write a piece for their Writer on Writer series, so I chose Irvine Welsh. Here is my article for those interested in IW:


IRVINE WELSH by Adrian Deans​

I was working in London, in 1995, when I first became aware of Irvine Welsh. The movie Trainspotting was about to come out and was being flogged shamelessly on the Underground, and just about everywhere else.

Sometimes you can just about tell in advance when a watershed is about to hit. There was a strange, compelling magic to the movie posters which proclaimed difference – which demanded attention – which said: “Miss this, and your relevant life is over.”

Of course, to the cognoscenti in 1995, Irvine Welsh was old news. Trainspotting had been famously described in 1992 by Rebel Inc as: “The greatest book ever written by man or woman...deserves to sell more copies than the Bible.” But it was new to me, and that English summer I discovered my favourite writer since Orwell.

I must have read Trainspotting about 20 times – The Acid House about 10 – Porno probably five or six – Filth, Glue and Ecstasy at least twice and the rest just once. There are times, for me, when nothing will serve but Irvine Welsh and I can go weeks reading nothing else.

Why?

All great writers, I believe, explore the human condition through their own peculiar prism, and for Irvine Welsh that prism is the world of the Edinburgh junkies, schemies and wide-os, where moral decay is worn on the sleeve like a VC stolen from your best mate’s grandad and sold for drugs.

So where’s the honour? Where’s the uplifting hero’s journey – the character arc taking Renton, Sickboy, Juice Terry or Begbie to an acceptable redemption after a harrowing tale of disentitlement and oppression?

There is no honour. There is only survival, with morality featuring merely as a collateral victim in the psychopathic carnage of story.

Irvine Welsh takes his readers beyond the middle class axiom that all people are fundamentally decent and will do-the-right-thing-if-given-half-a-chance-by-an-uncaring-society. Irvine Welsh’s characters are not fundamentally decent. They are cold, selfish, hedonistic, murderous cunts, who somehow manage to be hilariously funny and can give the bourgeois reader profound insights into the human condition, which he or she will never get reading Joyce, Proust, Konrad, Heller, Golding or even (dare I say it) Orwell.

And he’s not afraid to tamper with established writing conventions. Trainspotting and Porno are both told as multiple first-person narratives – and he doesn’t even bother making it plain who is speaking! The reader must work it out for him/herself and it sometimes takes a while, but the reward is that you are inside the heads and privy to the hopes, fears, motivations, petty spites and idle fancies of the main characters. Done badly, this would be a turgid, unreadable mess. Done well, the reading experience is like watching (and hearing) a vivid movie inside your own head.

A common criticism of Irvine Welsh is the difficulty some have with his phonetic style which is designed to give the reader access to the authentic sounds and rhythms of the Edinburgh dialect.

I love it.

Sure, it takes a bit of work, but once you “get it” you really are transported into the guts of the story and feel it intensely like you feel (for example) Anthony Burgess’s A Clockwork Orange – which employs similar linguistic devices and traverses similar socio-moral territory.

My one regret regarding Irvine is this – his best work was his earliest work. His most recent works have been derivative – even forgettable. To compare him with my number one hero, Orwell grew as a writer – taking giant steps in the 1940s and culminating with his masterpiece, 1984, which was published only five weeks before his death.

Having said that, Orwell had a mid-career slump (Coming Up for Air; A Clergyman’s Daughter anyone?) so who knows what might lie ahead for Irvine Welsh?

I understand that he is currently writing Skagboys – a prequel to Trainspotting – which I hope and pray will take us back to his original muse – or somewhere harrowing, better and different once again.
Click to expand...

My initial experience with Irvine Welsh was almost identical.

I came out of Clapham Picture House after seeing Trainspotting with its neon-orange posters and that high-energy Iggy Pop soundtrack still ringing in my ears was a classic 1990s London moment.

Stepping out of the pictures and back into the hum of South London after a film like that can feel like a sensory reset. It’s that rare cinematic high you sometimes get where the world outside looks a little sharper and the air feels that bit colder.

First thing I did the next day after work was pop into WH Smith and bought the book....

And while Danny Boyle’s film was a high-octane and stylishly funny post-punk fever dream, Irvine Welsh’s novel is a much more fractured, brutal, and complex beast to say the least....

The book is arguably less "cool" and more harrowing. It explores the political and social landscape of Leith-Edinburgh-Scotland in a way that the film’s soundtrack and professional editing glosses over.

And while Trainspotting is often remembered for its grim subject matter, for a huge generation of readers, it wasn't just a book about addiction it was a democratisation of literature....

Scottish literature...hence my slightly bold Scottish 'Charles Dickens' comparison....
 
Mr Cleansheets said:
Speaking of Edinburgh as a backdrop, my favourite author of the last 30 years is definitely Irvine Welsh. Some of his last books were disappointing, but the first few were absolute masterpieces.

Especially Trainspotting; Acid House; Ecstasy; Filth; Glue; Porno
Click to expand...
I’ve heard Trainspotting is a very good film, but a bit gruesome according to my better half. So I haven’t sought the book out.
 
Mr Cleansheets said:
Scottish Charles Dickens ... interesting idea.

Some years ago I was commissioned by the NSW Writers' Centre to write a piece for their Writer on Writer series, so I chose Irvine Welsh. Here is my article for those interested in IW:


IRVINE WELSH by Adrian Deans​

I was working in London, in 1995, when I first became aware of Irvine Welsh. The movie Trainspotting was about to come out and was being flogged shamelessly on the Underground, and just about everywhere else.

Sometimes you can just about tell in advance when a watershed is about to hit. There was a strange, compelling magic to the movie posters which proclaimed difference – which demanded attention – which said: “Miss this, and your relevant life is over.”

Of course, to the cognoscenti in 1995, Irvine Welsh was old news. Trainspotting had been famously described in 1992 by Rebel Inc as: “The greatest book ever written by man or woman...deserves to sell more copies than the Bible.” But it was new to me, and that English summer I discovered my favourite writer since Orwell.

I must have read Trainspotting about 20 times – The Acid House about 10 – Porno probably five or six – Filth, Glue and Ecstasy at least twice and the rest just once. There are times, for me, when nothing will serve but Irvine Welsh and I can go weeks reading nothing else.

Why?

All great writers, I believe, explore the human condition through their own peculiar prism, and for Irvine Welsh that prism is the world of the Edinburgh junkies, schemies and wide-os, where moral decay is worn on the sleeve like a VC stolen from your best mate’s grandad and sold for drugs.

So where’s the honour? Where’s the uplifting hero’s journey – the character arc taking Renton, Sickboy, Juice Terry or Begbie to an acceptable redemption after a harrowing tale of disentitlement and oppression?

There is no honour. There is only survival, with morality featuring merely as a collateral victim in the psychopathic carnage of story.

Irvine Welsh takes his readers beyond the middle class axiom that all people are fundamentally decent and will do-the-right-thing-if-given-half-a-chance-by-an-uncaring-society. Irvine Welsh’s characters are not fundamentally decent. They are cold, selfish, hedonistic, murderous cunts, who somehow manage to be hilariously funny and can give the bourgeois reader profound insights into the human condition, which he or she will never get reading Joyce, Proust, Konrad, Heller, Golding or even (dare I say it) Orwell.

And he’s not afraid to tamper with established writing conventions. Trainspotting and Porno are both told as multiple first-person narratives – and he doesn’t even bother making it plain who is speaking! The reader must work it out for him/herself and it sometimes takes a while, but the reward is that you are inside the heads and privy to the hopes, fears, motivations, petty spites and idle fancies of the main characters. Done badly, this would be a turgid, unreadable mess. Done well, the reading experience is like watching (and hearing) a vivid movie inside your own head.

A common criticism of Irvine Welsh is the difficulty some have with his phonetic style which is designed to give the reader access to the authentic sounds and rhythms of the Edinburgh dialect.

I love it.

Sure, it takes a bit of work, but once you “get it” you really are transported into the guts of the story and feel it intensely like you feel (for example) Anthony Burgess’s A Clockwork Orange – which employs similar linguistic devices and traverses similar socio-moral territory.

My one regret regarding Irvine is this – his best work was his earliest work. His most recent works have been derivative – even forgettable. To compare him with my number one hero, Orwell grew as a writer – taking giant steps in the 1940s and culminating with his masterpiece, 1984, which was published only five weeks before his death.

Having said that, Orwell had a mid-career slump (Coming Up for Air; A Clergyman’s Daughter anyone?) so who knows what might lie ahead for Irvine Welsh?

I understand that he is currently writing Skagboys – a prequel to Trainspotting – which I hope and pray will take us back to his original muse – or somewhere harrowing, better and different once again.
Click to expand...
Terrific review!

That his best is his first book, surprises me? Jane Harper might be the same.
 
Lots of writers' best book was their first book. I guess it takes them forever to get something published so they do their absolute best to get something to stand out from the slush pile, but after that they have less motivation or no new ideas. Or even that they move on artistically but their readers stay back in that original place and are disappointed with subsequent works.

Personally, I believe I've improved a lot since Mr C but lots of people still tell me it's their favourite book of mine.
 
On a different topic... very much enjoying Woody Woodmansey's book: Spider from Mars: My Life with Bowie

I've been deeply immersed in Bowie lately and Woody (his early drummer) tells a cracking yarn.
 
I mostly read Science Fiction. Any other fans here? The latest book in the Murderbot Diaries just got released. Also itching to read the latest book in the Dungeon Crawler Carl series. Possibly the best series I've read in a long while.
 
Quicky said:
I mostly read Science Fiction. Any other fans here? The latest book in the Murderbot Diaries just got released. Also itching to read the latest book in the Dungeon Crawler Carl series. Possibly the best series I've read in a long while.
Click to expand...
I was a massive sci-fi reader when younger - went off it for a few years but have drifted back in in recent times.

I tend most to enjoy books written in the 50s, 60s and 70s - later books I find are not so good in the storytelling department which is what I most enjoy. I do like Andy Weir and loved Ready Player One but hated Ender's Game and a few other novels that most younger sci-fi readers love.
 
Mr Cleansheets said:
I was a massive sci-fi reader when younger - went off it for a few years but have drifted back in in recent times.

I tend most to enjoy books written in the 50s, 60s and 70s - later books I find are not so good in the storytelling department which is what I most enjoy. I do like Andy Weir and loved Ready Player One but hated Ender's Game and a few other novels that most younger sci-fi readers love.
Click to expand...
I've read a little bif of older Sci Fi. Asimov, AE Van Vogt, Niven, Silverberg. Some of the older stuff has great concepts but their characters aren't as strong.

Weirs fantastic. Project Hail Mary was someyhing else and the movie adaptation was bang on mostly.

Have you read any Alastair Reynolds? I really enjoy his work especially his Revelation Space novels. Gritty space opera stuff.
 
Haven't tried Reynolds - will look out for it, although space opera is not my thing. Much prefer the high concept novels. Throw in a cracking plot and I'm hooked. Van Vogt is great for that (loved Slan) and Andre Norton is fabulous also. The Zero Stone and Uncharted Stars are two of my favourites.
 
Mr Cleansheets said:
Lots of writers' best book was their first book. I guess it takes them forever to get something published so they do their absolute best to get something to stand out from the slush pile, but after that they have less motivation or no new ideas. Or even that they move on artistically but their readers stay back in that original place and are disappointed with subsequent works.

Personally, I believe I've improved a lot since Mr C but lots of people still tell me it's their favourite book of mine.
Click to expand...
Not sure if your other books have the humour element of Mr C? Considering how sensible you are on G and G, the humour is a real feature of Mr C.
 
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Quicky said:
I mostly read Science Fiction. Any other fans here? The latest book in the Murderbot Diaries just got released. Also itching to read the latest book in the Dungeon Crawler Carl series. Possibly the best series I've read in a long while.
Click to expand...
Used to read it a lot decades ago.

Nor sure why I've lost interest in the genre?
 
V IS FOR VENGEANCE: SUE GRAFTON

Genre: Murder mystery

Setting: California, about 20 odd years ago

Length: 437 pages

Why did I choose this book? I've liked all SG's books in this series and I may have read it decades ago.

Review:
A young college grad is murdered when unable to pay back her loan funded by criminal, Lorenzo Dante.

2 years later, PI Kinsey Millhone, assists in apprehending a shoplifter, Audrey Vance. Subsequently, Audrey's body is found below Spring Bridge. Suspected suicide according to cops. Her friend, Marvin Striker, hires Kinsey to investigate.

Lorenzo Dante, is weary of life in organised crime and frustrated with violent, reckless brother, Cappi. LD meets beautiful Nora, who exerts a powerful influence on him. The plot unfolds well. There are some good twists and turns.

Sue G's protagonist PI, Kinsey M, has been described as ditzy, but is a good investigator and sees humour in many settings, mocking herself. I thought this book is one of Sue G's better books.

Sue G's books don't seem dated reading them a few decades later. Whereas her peer crime writers Sarah Peretsky and Patricia Cornwell do. Ditto thriller writer Fred Forsyth, even John Le Carre, seem dated.
 
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