The Deadman's Pedal

Description

Winner of the James Tait Black Fiction Prize this is 'A wonderful reconstruction of small-town Scotland in the 1970s, a hymn to teenage innocence and an elegy for old industries and the men who worked in them - Alan Warner's best yet' Herald Winner of the James Tait Black Fiction Prize For 16-year-old Simon Crimmons there is not a lot to do. Going nowhere, fed up with school, he leaves to work as a driver on the trains. That summer he is introduced to a world of grown-up glamour, strikes and girlfriends. When Simon falls for the ethereal, aristocratic Varie, he finds freedom and adventure but will it be at a price? Too 'posh' for the railways, too 'working class' for Varie, Simon must navigate what it means to be a man as his world is turned upside down.

Alan Warner is the author of six previous novels- Morvern Callar, These Demented Lands, The Sopranos, The Man Who Walks, The Worms Can Carry Me To Heaven and The Stars in the Bright Sky, which was longlisted for the 2010 Man Booker Prize. He is Writer in Residence at Edinburgh University.

A delight: a boisterous, kindly, deep, sweet romp of a thing * Scotsman * Absolutely beautiful... As far as I'm concerned he's emerging as the William Faulkner of British fiction: somebody who's created a body of work that has not only animated a language but a period and a place... He has this incredible talent -- Andrew O'Hagan This is the best Scottish fiction since Lanark * Scottish Review of Books * Morally sensitive, exquisitely written and emotionally mature * Guardian * If you still haven't read it from last year, Alan Warner's The Deadman's Pedal was out in paperback in this. Read it -- Janice Galloway * Scotsman *