- Paperback: 207 pages
- Publisher: Luath Press Ltd (1 Nov 2001)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 1842820141
- ISBN-13: 978-1842820148
- Product Dimensions: 17.2 x 11 x 1.6 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 1,409,476 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Review
'The most talked about book in the Scottish publishing world... a springboard for inventiveness... if you can't get hold of a copy, mug somebody' MARK STEPHEN, SCOTTISH CONNECTION, BBC RADIO SCOTLAND 'I have no Scots... but I can, with occasional hiccups, read Fitt's offering and am doing so with much enjoyment.' KATIE GRANT, THE TIMES 'I began to think and sometimes dream in Scots.' GREGOR STEELE, TIMES EDUCATIONAL SUPPLEMENT 'easier to read than Shakespeare, and twice the fun.' DES DILLON 'Matthew Fitt will do for prose in Scots what Hugh MacDlarmid did for poetry in Scots' JAMES ROBERTSON 'a cracker' GERALDINE BRENNAN, TIMES EDUCATIONAL SUPPLEMENT 'going where no man has gone before' STEPHEN NAYSMITH, THE HERALD 'not a traditional rustic tale... I could understand quite a lot of that' (SUE MACGREGOR); 'the last man who tried anything like this was Hugh MacDiarmid' (MICHAEL FRY), TODAY PROGRAMME, BBC RADIO 4 'After an initial shock, readers of this sprightly and imaginative tale will begin to relish its verbal impetus, where a standard Lallans, laced with bits of Dundonian and Aberdonian, is stretched and skelped to meet the demands of cyberjannies and virtual hoorhooses... I recommend an entertaining and groundbreaking book.' EDWIN MORGAN
Product Description
The year is 2090. Global flooding has left most of Scotland under water. The descendants of those who survived God's Flood live in a community of floating island parishes, known collectively as Port. Port's citizens live in mortal fear of Senga, a supervirus whose victims are kept in a giant hospital warehouse in sealed capsules called Kists. Paolo Broon is a low-ranking cyberjanny. His life-partner, Nadia, lies forgotten and alone in Omega Kist 624 in the Rigo Imbeki Medical Center. When he receives an unexpected message from his radge criminal father to meet him at But n Ben A-Go-Go, Paolo's life is changed forever. He must traverse VINE, Port and the Drylands and deal with rebel American tourists and crabbit Dundonian microchips to discover the truth about his family's past in order to free Nadia from the sair grip of the merciless Senga. Set in a distinctly unbonnie future-Scotland, the novel's dangerous atmosphere and psychologically-malkied characters weave a tale that both chills and intrigues. In But n Ben A-Go-Go Matthew Fitt takes the allegedly dead language of Scots and energises it with a narrative that crackles and fizzes with life.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This is amazing! It's hard to imagine anything that could so clearly prove Scots isn't fossilised in Burns' era. If you can write cyberpunk in it, you can certainly write contemporary in it! The familiar Blade-Runner neologisms take on a whole new life when "translated" into neo-Scots, even something as simple as the standard sf "plastipack" becoming a "plastipoke" makes this feel like a real, Scottish future.
The story itself is pretty good, although the way the disease that propels the plot actually works seems a bit confused. However it acts more as a McGuffin than anything else, so I'll let that go. I also loved the setting: due to global warming future Scotland is a series of floating parishes, with the higher Highland mountains becoming a chain of islands!
I'm also not sure why the police are called the Ceilidh, which is Gaelic for a village dance. I suspect there's a joke there I'm missing.
9 of 10 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
If you like science fiction, and the Scots tongue, you will enjoy this zany book. Global warming has got a lot worse, and universal flooding means that only the tops of the mountains are above sea level. People live their dysfunctional lives in floating cities, tethered to the seabed. They relieve the monotony by trips into cyberspace. Real sex is not an option because of the prevalence of the deadly Senga (a virulent form of HIV), so most people stick to virtual sex. Unfortunately Nadia, the wife of our hero Paulo Broon, has been having it off the old-fashioned way with Paulo's dad, the infected arch-criminal Diamond Broon. Nadia is kept alive, locked up in a mortuary kist, and cannot be terminated until she is injected with Diamond's DNA. Diamond lives the life of Reilly in Inverdisney Penitentiary, an establishment for wealthy criminals. Paulo and Diamond arrange to meet at But n Ben A-Go-Go, Diamond's luxurious ranch on dry land at the top of Schiehallion. Paulo has heroic adventures getting there, and stravaigs like Fingal over a greater Celtic world. Don't expect a happy ending, but it's a good read. Oh, and by the wey, ye hae tae unnerstaun sentences like: "Then the howf's waws bloustered intae a cosmic stramash o a zillion pixels an a braid loch o lowin white licht kythed ablow his feet."
8 of 9 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This book is quite incredible. It uses the Scots vernacular language for a start, and no this language is not dead. It also tells an amazing futuristic story which encomapsses all our fears about sexually transmitted diseases, global warming and drugs.
The book is fantastic. I have bought and given away quite a few copies now and guess what, they don't come back. Read it and love it. If you can't read it you are not using all your brain, or maybe you don't have one.
The book is fantastic. I have bought and given away quite a few copies now and guess what, they don't come back. Read it and love it. If you can't read it you are not using all your brain, or maybe you don't have one.
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