Books
The Skinny book guide – bringing you book reviews, features, events, reviews and author interviews. Find previews and on the ground reporting from festivals of literature and poetry in Scotland and beyond.
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Book Reviews
Lord of Misrule by Jaimy Gordon
This earthy tale is set at a 1970s Virginia racetrack, in the deeply unglamorous, chancy world of claiming races. A ragtag band of characters survive... Read more »| 01 Sep 2011 -
Book Reviews
Hot Off The Comics Press: The DC Reboot
Is it really the end of summer? It may very well be, as the sunshine begins to dissipate and the big events come to an end. Of course for one particular publ... Read more »| 31 Aug 2011 -
Features
Alan Bissett: "It does get harder"
Alan Bissett is the author of four novels, beginning with Boyracers ten years ago, as well as plays, short stories and other pieces. The characters in Boyracers are revisited in his upcoming novel Pack Men, as they travel down to Manchester in 2008 to watch Rangers play in the UEFA Cup Final Read more »| 29 Aug 2011 -
Features
Zoë Strachan: “The freedom to try things out”
Scottish author Zoë Strachan talks about her latest novel, Ever Fallen In Love, and why writing gets more difficult with every book Read more »| 29 Aug 2011 -
Book Reviews
The Borrower by Rebecca Makkai
On face value, The Borrower is a story about a librarian, a small boy and the primacy of the written word; on second thought it is a political satire... Read more »| 25 Aug 2011 -
Book Reviews
Good As Dead by Mark Billingham
Not to be confused with Mark Billingham’s last book, From The Dead, this latest offering is a solid police procedural. In fact, there’s r... Read more »| 25 Aug 2011
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Festivals
Edinburgh International Book Festival: Yorkston vs Rankin!
Singer, songwriter and Fence Collective member James Yorkston will be interviewed by Ian Rankin. Need we say more? Read more »| 04 Aug 2011 -
Festivals
Edinburgh International Book Festival: Mr Gray, His Life and His Play
Artist, novelist and playwright (amongst many other things) Alasdair Gray has two events at the Book Festival this year. We caught up with the man himself for a quiet word about what to expect Read more »| 04 Aug 2011 -
Festivals
Edinburgh International Book Festival: Lots To Do and See
Perhaps too much to do and see? Want to see something at the Book Festival, but don’t know where to start? Don’t worry, we’ve broken it all down into event types to make it easier to digest. That’s the theory, anyway Read more »| 03 Aug 2011 -
Book Reviews
The Incomplete Tim Key, by Tim Key
Tim Key’s quirky, humorous, poems were very enjoyable. In fact, I had to share them. I shared them with my cat, Charlie. Charlie bloody loved them! He ... Read more »| 02 Aug 2011 -
Book Reviews
Tretower to Clyro:Essays by Karl Miller
This is a genial collection of essays by an esteemed critic, including a foreword by one of his friends, Andrew O’Hagan, and pieces on his frie... Read more »| 29 Jul 2011 -
Book Reviews
The Immaculate Heart by Andrew Raymond Drennan
This book, his second published work, is something of a leap forward for Andrew Raymond Drennan, with his prose in particular significantly more confident th... Read more »| 28 Jul 2011 -
Book Reviews
A Summer of Drowning by John Burnside
John Burnside's eighth novel is both an evolution of his previous work and an entirely self-contained fable. It is set in the Norwegian Arctic Circle... Read more »| 27 Jul 2011 -
Book Reviews
Aaron and Ahmed by Jay Cantor (writer) and James Romberger (artist)
Aaron and Ahmed is subtitled ‘A Love Story’, but it’s not that simple. It’s the story of Aaron, who becomes a soldier in Guantanamo B... Read more »| 07 Jul 2011 -
Festivals
The Ways of Richard Wiseman
Richard Wiseman is Professor of the Public Understanding of Psychology at University of Hertfordshire. But before that, he was a professional magician. He describes this transition as “pretty straightforward” Read more »| 01 Jul 2011