Para Handy

Para Handy has been sailing his way into the affections of generations of Scots since he first weighed anchor in the pages of the Glasgow Evening News nearly a hundred years ago. The Master Mariner and his crew – Dougie the Mate, Macphail the Engineer, Sunny Jim and The Tar – all play their part in evoking the irresistible atmosphere of a bygone age when puffers sailed between West Highland ports and the great city of Glasgow. This definitive edition contains all three collections published in the author’s lifetime, as well as a new story never previously published. Extensive notes accompany each story, providing fascinating insights into colloquialisms, place-names and historical events. This volume also includes a wealth of contemporary photographs, depicting the harbours, steamers and puffers from the age of the Vital Spark. This edition includes one further story, which was discovered in 2001.

Reviews of Para Handy

'… will delight readers old and new' – Scots Magazine 'A fine collection from Birlinn… really well-presented, introduced and edited… light-hearted but exemplary in scholarship… a delightful large volume' – Douglas Gifford, Books in Scotland