THE BEST OF SCOTTISH BOOKS

Everyone knows her life story.
But who will win her heart?

Gertie has always had her head in the clouds, wondering what her life might be like if she could only pluck up the courage to leave the remote Scottish island where she was born.

It’s the only place she knows, but you can’t do anything there without everyone knowing – the glue of this close-knit community is the Knitting Circle, a group of strong, capable and frankly nosy women who work hard, gossip, knit and support each other through thick and thin. At the centre of this sisterhood is Gertie’s mum Jean and her grandmother Elspeth, and the three generations of women live together, surrounded by wool, in one small cottage.

When the chance comes to make changes – a new job working with old schoolfriend Morag on the local airline, new friends and even a possible new romance – a world of possibilities opens up before Gertie. Is this the way to make her dreams come true?

New Writing Scotland is the principal forum for poetry and short fiction in Scotland today. Every year it publishes the very best from both emerging and established writers, and lists many of the leading literary lights of Scotland among its past (and present) contributors. Don’t. Even. Ask. Too. Hot: New Writing Scotland 42 is the latest collection of excellent contemporary literature, drawn from a wide cross-section of Scottish culture and society, and includes new work from forty-nine authors – some internationally renowned, and some just beginning their careers.

The Slab Boys Trilogy by John Byrne – now considered one of Scotland’s defining literary works of the twentieth century – captures the rebellious mood of a generation growing up against a backdrop of James Dean, Elvis, sharp suits and despair.

Spanning the 1950s to the 70s, the plays capture the rebellious mood of a post-war generation growing up to a backdrop of James Dean, Elvis, sharp-suited glamour, hope and despair.

John Byrne takes the slab room he worked in and makes it pure theatre: the scams, the dreams, the aloof but gorgeous girl, the despair of life back home, the obligatory tormenting of the office ‘weed’, and the mandatory boy chat and pranks all help the day to pass. Phil and Spanky explode onto the stage in a classic vaudeville double-act.

Now considered one of Scotland’s defining literary works of the twentieth century, the Slab Boys Trilogy premiered at the Traverse back in the late 1970s and early 80s taking Scotland, then Britain, and then Broadway quickly by storm.

The Traverse revived the Slab Boys Trilogy for the theatre’s fortieth anniversary in November 2003.

Scots: The Mither Tongue is a classic of contemporary Scottish culture and essential reading for those who care about their country’s identity in the twenty-first century. It is a passionately written history of how the Scots have come to speak the way they do and has acted as a catalyst for radical changes in attitude towards the language.

In this completely revised edition, Kay vigorously renews the social, cultural and political debate on Scotland’s linguistic future, and argues convincingly for the necessity to retain and extend Scots if the nation is to hold on to its intrinsic values. Kay places Scots in an international context, comparing and contrasting it with other lesser-used European languages, while at home questioning the Scottish Executive’s desire to pay anything more than lip service to this crucial part of our national identity.

Language is central to people’s existence, and this vivid account celebrates the survival of Scots in its various dialects, its literature and song. The mither tongue is a national treasure that thrives in many parts of the country and underpins the speech of everyone who calls themselves a Scot.

An awfu stramash befaws the wee mowdie, yin bricht sunny morn. It looks a bit like a link sasser, an the warst o t is it faws richt ontae his heid. Oor gallus wee hero gangs oot tae speir wha s keeched on his heid. Outrageously funny, this cracking little book is an absolute delight. It not only gives children the chance to talk about one of their favourite topics for discussion, it is also an intriguing way of introducing the idea of a nature trail, taking them on a trip that will leave them both laughing and learning.

Winner of the Bookbug Picture Book Prize

Benny was different… Benny was special… Benny was a robot… Benny had a bright red button in the middle of his tummy. On the button, written in big, bold letters were the words ‘Only Press in an Emergency’. Benny had never pressed his button but often wondered what would happen if he did get to press it… One day he found out!

Winner of the Klaus Flugge Prize

Winner of the V&A Illustration Award

A young boy discusses the journey he is about to make with his mother. They will leave their town, she explains, and it will be sad but also a little bit exciting. They will have to say goodbye to friends and loved ones, and that will be difficult. They will have to walk and walk and walk, and although they will see many new and interesting things, it will be difficult at times too. A powerful and moving exploration that draws the young reader into each stage of the journey, inviting the chance to imagine the decisions he or she would make.

From the streets of working class Scotland, and on occasion, a little beyond our solar system, comes one of the country s most hilarious debut writers. Putting surreal and witty twists on the everyday, Chris McQueer creates recognisable characters you will love and want to avoid like the plague. Peter s earned his night off, and there s not a bloody chance he s covering Shelley s shift. He just needs to find some pals for the perfect cover story. Deek is going to be at the forefront of the outsider art movement and do Banksy proud. Davie loves tattoos and his latest is going to be a masterpiece. Tam is one of the most creative minds in the galaxy (apparently), but creating parallel universes can cause problems. Everybody on Earth wakes up with their knees on backwards. He caught folks imagination on Medium with his stories, had rooms howling with laughter on the spoken word circuit, and now it s time to put Chris McQueer on the page. Are you ready?

Scotland has a stunning tradition of oral storytelling, from the firesides of the nation’s legendary storytelling families to the physical and virtual platforms of today’s narrative performers. Scotland is also a place with a strange, longstanding affinity with that most chilling of genres: the Gothic.

Haunted Voices – a bold and ambitious anthology in both text and audio – showcases some of Scotland’s best oral storytellers, from archived stories of past masters to the work of contemporary performers, and their most disturbing tales of terror.

Expect monstrous tongue-eaters, shadowy demons, haunted video tapes, wicked priests, strange shapes in the darkness, a retelling of Poe’s The Raven… and more!

Scotland may be small, but it has many, many voices. So gather round and listen close. This is Haunted Voices: Scotland’s great Gothic chorus.

Contributors: Fiona Barnett, Paul Bristow, P. D. Brown, Anna Cheung, Pauline Cordiner, Chris Edwards, Fran Flett Hollinrake, Gavin Inglis, Daiva Ivanauskaitė, Sheila Kinninmonth, Kirsty Logan, Seoras Macpherson, Ali Maloney, Daru McAleece, Conner McAleese, Jen McGregor, Paul McQuade, Ricky Monahan Brown, Alycia Pirmohamed, Gauri Raje, Jude Reid, Max Scratchmann, Sean Wai Keung, D. A. Watson, Katalina Watt.

Winner of Scots Bairns’ Book of the Year 2023 at the Scots Language Awards

In Guid Morning! a young boy is awake before his mums and sister. It’s too early to make a sound…but what’s that noise?! Two rumbling tummies need to be fed! The boy and his cat have fun starting their day – all by themselves. In Guid Nicht! a young girl is trying to get ready for bed, but her puppy thinks it’s time to play. Tired of being ignored, the puppy steals her teddy bear. Under the table, over the chair, her dads give chase and try to rescue bear. It seems puppy is getting to play after all!

Shortlisted for the 2022 International Booker Prize

After Rita is found dead in a church she used to attend, the official investigation into the incident is quickly closed. Her sickly mother is the only person still determined to find the culprit. Chronicling a difficult journey across the suburbs of the city, an old debt and a revealing conversation, Elena Knows unravels the secrets of its characters and the hidden facets of authoritarianism and hypocrisy in our society.

WINNER OF THE 1996 WILLIAM HILL SPORTS BOOK OF THE YEAR PRIZE. 

In the early 1990s, Donald McRae set out to discover the truth about the intense and forbidding world of professional boxing. Travelling around the United States and Britain, he was welcomed into the inner sanctums of some of the greatest fighters of the period – men such as Mike Tyson, Chris Eubank, Oscar de la Hoya, Frank Bruno, Evander Holyfield and Naseem Hamed among them. They opened up to him, revealing unforgettable personal stories from both inside and outside the ring, and explaining why it is that some are driven to compete in this most brutal of sports, risking their health and even their lives.

The result is a classic account of boxing that remains as fresh and entertaining as when it was first published 20 years ago. McRae approaches his subjects with wit, compassion and insight, and the result was a book that was a deserved winner of the William Hill Sports Book of the Year prize.

Winner of the 2022 Highland Book Prize. A new collection of short stories from the author of Tocasaid ’Ain Tuirc, bringing the same sharp wit and observational skill to this evocation of Lewis life and people from last century intertwined with stories situated elsewhere, and giving as authentic a voice to an angry child’s resentment, a woman’s regret or an old man’s fears. Duncan Gillies is from Knockaird, in Ness, the northern tip of the Isle of Lewis. Fig Tree is his fourth published collection of short stories and the first book of his in which Gaelic and English appear together, side by side.

‘My life sentence had actually started the day I left my mother’s womb…’

Jimmy Boyle grew up in Glasgow’s Gorbals. All around him the world was drinking, fighting and thieving. To survive, he too had to fight and steal… Kids’ gangs led to trouble with the police. Approved schools led to Borstal, and Jimmy was on his way to a career in crime.

By his twenties he was a hardened villain, sleeping with prostitutes, running shebeens and money-lending rackets. Then they nailed him for murder. The sentence was life – the brutal, degrading eternity of a broken spirit in the prisons of Peterhead and Inverness. Thankfully, Jimmy was able to turn his life around inside the prison walls and eventually released on parole.

A Sense of Freedom is a searing indictment of a society that uses prison bars and brutality to destroy a man’s humanity and at the same time an outstanding testament to one man’s ability to survive, to find a new life, a new creativity, and a new alternative.

Polkadot Wounds is a delight, wrestling with life in our restless times. Capildeo entices us to enter conversations with others (dead and living), amongst glimpsing reflections of encounters. Landscapes become ‘landskips’, playing on traditions of travel and nature writing, childlike spontaneity and movement across gaps. Dante’s Divine Comedy frames untimely deaths and breakthroughs of joy, during the pandemic and in queer and far-flung communities. The title of the book is inspired by the stones of the ruined Norman castle in Launceston, Cornwall, and the local martyr, St Cuthbert Mayne, where Capildeo was writer-in-residence with the Charles Causley Trust.

Spanning the life of Frederic Chopin, Nocturne focuses particularly on his last years through the eyes of an extraordinary parade of well known names, Delacroix, Victor Hugo, Franz Liszt, George Sand, and the lonely and faithful Scottish woman, Jane Stirling, who loved him best of all.

Famous and feted, Chopin storms his way though Paris, London, Edinburgh and Glasgow. His music becomes more beautiful, his love affairs wilder and his spending completely out of control. Chopin burns too bright and too fast against a background of unrest and revolution. The people who love him best can only watch
helplessly as his flame threatens to burn itself out.

AN INTER-GENERATIONAL STRUGGLE BETWEEN TWO GREAT POWERS

The conflict between China and the West is vividly told through the lives of four generations of a family of Chinese gangsters and spies.

Benny Hu is a man looking for a past. British born but orphaned, he is recruited by the UK security services. Tasked to combat a resurgent China in the Far East and Africa, he is also determined to find his mother, a Hong Kong film star in the 1970’s, who disappeared under mysterious and brutal circumstances. This journey of discovery links him to the gangster warlords of Shanghai in the early 1900s and the toxic interplay between the western world and China.

When the terrible toll this has taken on his family is revealed, he is left with a final, desperate decision.

LIFE AND DEATH.

SEX AND MURDER.

CLIMATE CHANGE, GODS, MASS DESTRUCTION, FRATRICIDE AND MONSTERS.

AND THAT’S ONLY THE BOOK OF GENESIS…

Beelzebub’s Bible is no less strange. Gods and devils abound. From ancient Babylon to twenty-first century Hollywood, strange forces and mysterious powers are out to prey on mere mortals.

Stephen Zoltan’s darkly delicious vision takes us all the way from Eden to Revelation via the half-forgotten Holy Lands of the imagination, while ancient storylines mingle with heathen visions and pagan revelations in an unholy canon that could have been convened by Beëlzebub himself.

The only thing to fear about the past is it may destroy the future…

‘Fun, romantic and heartbreaking. Serious Outlander vibes with a fresh new twist.’ Pim Wangtechawat, author of The Moon Represents my Heart

2005: While researching her Japanese ancestors, Isla travels from Scotland to Kagoshima. There, a vicious typhoon hurls her through a strange white gate and back to 1877, amid the dawn of the Satsuma Rebellion – the conflict that ended the samurai.

When she meets Keiichiro Maeda, a samurai who introduces her to a way of life only previously encountered in books, Isla begins to wonder if she has found her true home. But as the samurai fight a losing battle, she is increasingly distraught. Should she forewarn Keiichiro and save the man she loves or let him die the glorious death he so believes in, proud to the end that he remained a faithful warrior?

And what will become of Isla? Is she willing to leave the past behind, knowing her future will forever be changed?

‘Refreshingly original… A stunning debut.’ Jason Ayres, author of The Time Bubble series

Explore the enchanting islands of Scotland with this absorbing and beautiful guide.

Around the coast of Scotland there are hundreds of islands, from bare, rugged skerries to lush dominions of history and deep-rooted culture. Each offers a unique haven to explore, whether you enjoy sparkling-white sandy beaches, miles of untouched land beneath your feet, nature-spotting among otters, puffins, seals and more, sampling the finest whisky and cheeses, or learning more about Scotland’s history.

Exploring Scotland’s Islands describes the main island groups in all their moods, and focuses on what gives these islands such magical and lasting appeal. This book is a glorious celebration in words, maps, illustrations and photographs of some of the most superb scenery in Scotland. Discover why these unique isles draw those lucky enough to find them back to visit whenever they can.

Among captivating descriptive text and beautiful photography, Exploring Scotland’s Islands also provides the reader with essential visitor information such as transport links, the most inspiring visitor attractions and sights to see, cafés and restaurants not to be missed, and where you can stay to make your visits all the more special.