Docherty

Tam Docherty’s youngest son, Conn, is born at the end of 1903 in a small working-class town in the west of Scotland. Tam will stop at nothing to make sure that life and the pits don’t swallow up his boy, the way it did him. Courageous and questioning, Docherty emerges as a leader of almost unshakable strength, but in a close-knit community tradition is a powerful opponent.

Reviews of Docherty

William McIlvanney paints a world of harsh reality, but does so in language that is strangely beautiful and hauntingly poetic. His work defies pigeonholing in any genre: this is simply great writing from a master of his craft — CRAIG RUSSELL Here a human history is mined with humour and a clenching sense of its sombre inequities: man's squat but lengthening shadow in the sun * Guardian * He has a hard muscular quality to his writing. Some of his phrases hammer against you like a collier's pick * The Times * An intense, witty and beautifully wrought novel * Daily Telegraph *