Customer Reviews

Skagboys

5 star:		(51)
4 star:		(17)
3 star:		(9)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

I had wondered if Irvine Welsh would ever get back to his best. I loved Trainspotting, Acid House, Marabou Stork Nightmares, Porno and a couple of others. But most recently he seems to have become a shadow of his former self. In particular, the awful "Master Chefs" was painful to read - was this really the same author that wrote Trainspotting, or some of the wonderful short stories in the Acid House.

So I bought this book with a sense of trepidation - but I needn't have worried. It's great, I loved every word of it. I was absorbed, back in the eighties with anti-hero Renton and the ever psychotic Francis Begbie. If you've lost faith with IW over the years, this is time to come back to the fold.

I enjoyed this book more than any of IW's for about ten years. Like most long novels it has a few dull moments, but overall it's a gripping read: I raced through it. There are two or three spots where IW seems to be straining for a big dramatic or comedic affect, but the power of the book really comes from the slow accretion of telling detail. (Is that what you call realism? I think so.)

A couple of those small details seemed not quite right for the 1980s, as I remember them, but what did seem 100% right was the overall feel of that sad decade. That strikes me as much more important, and I can't remember another novel that evokes working class Scottish life in the 1980s so accurately - well, one or two by James Kelman match it, but JK's are hard to pin down to specific decades, unlike this one.

IW seems to be trying to write a semi-documentary work, and I think he succeeds: it certainly took me back, whether I wanted to be taken back to those painful times or not. I don't think you have to have read Trainspotting to enjoy this: it makes sense in its own right.

Talking of other books, one I would like to read is IW's autobiography. It never occurred to me before, but the parts of this book that seem most personal and autobiographical - and I say SEEM, because I have no way of knowing if they really are - are the most powerful. The beautifully handled scenes in the Fife rehab house, for instance. As I came to the end of those temporarily optimistic pages, and the entirely believable tragedy of the conclusion started to seep in, then build and build, I found myself filled with renewed admiration for the tremendous storytelling skills of IW. And I also found myself, for the first time since Trainspotting, wondering how much of this was real. Because a lot of it felt real.

All the best bits felt real, and the few week spots were where IW strayed from reality. That's how it seemed to me, and if I'm right then IW's autobiography might be his real masterpiece.

If he ever writes such a thing.

This book really does see Irvine Welsh back doing what he does best. For some reason I was expecting to be disappointed by Skagboys, but I was gripped from the start, with Renton's involvement in the Battle of Orgreave giving a real feel of life during the mid 80's, and the hopelessness that led many in working class communities to seek solace in heroin.

Like all of Welsh's best work it's hilarious, tragic, sad and horrific in equal measures. I laughed out loud at Nicksy's suicide attempt sabotaging Sick Boy's efforts to snag a rich London girl. And also at Renton finding Keezbo locked out on the balcony of the parental home. I was saddened to see an, at times quite vulnerable Renton, not 'choosing life', when it seemed he could have had such a bright future. The scenes in the rehab centre in Fife were the best fictional writing I have read in a long time, and said much more about the true nature of heroin addiction than most of the so-called 'experts' ever will.

By the end of the book you can really feel the desperation of the main characters as they set off on a scam to try and cure the sickness of withdrawal. If you liked Trainspotting, you must read this book. If you've never read Irvine Welsh before, this is as good a place as any to start.

I've followed Welsh's work intently over the past decade and while I've enjoyed most of his books, I've often felt they pale in comparison to Trainspotting's immediacy and energy. Skagboys is a very worthy effort indeed. The first person voice takes us back to those characters, unmasks how they came to be the characters we know and along the way, it happens to be one of the funniest books I've read this year. A brilliant book.

Since reading 'Trainspotting' around the time it came out I have read and, to one degree or another, enjoyed every one of Irvine Welsh's books.

Before writing this review I had a look round at some of the other reviews and notice that this book does seem to polarise opinion, generally though most of the readers who have enjoyed previous Irvine Welsh books have enjoyed this one - though certainly not all. One reviewer likened "Skagboys" to the extras that turn on up on some DVDs, specifically that "Skagboys" is the extras for "Trainspotting" - a more in depth look at the main characters on their path to drug addiction, prison etc. I feel that does this book a slight disservice. I think the book stands up on its own merits. Whilst probably mainly appealing to people who read and enjoyed "Trainspotting" and "Porno".

Irvine Welsh says that "Skagboys" was written as part of Trainspotting, and at the same time, which makes sense. It's like a Scottish literary version of the superb US TV series The Wire. The book directly or indirectly touches on all aspects of the world of heroin during the Thatcher years, with the focus being on the core of working class lads from Leith. During the course of the book some of the characters move from Edinburgh; to London; briefly to Amsterdam and a stint working on a Sealink ferry; to a rehab centre near Fife; and even the Battle of Orgreave during the Miners Strike.

Irvine Welsh weaves in plenty of real life incidents into his narrative. I just mentioned the infamous Battle Of Orgreave, I was visiting Amsterdam in the mid 1980s when West Ham United and Manchester United hooligans caused chaos on the ferry to Holland and in the city. Those events appear in "Skagboys" too. Talk about art imitating life.

As with the other books about these characters the stories are told by different characters and from their different perspectives. This is a real strength and gives the reader insights into each of the main characters, and many of the more minor ones too. I think the "Trainspotting" crew inspire Irvine Welsh's best writing. "Skagboys" is another visceral page turner. It's such a shame that he is no longer flavour of the month, as this book is absolutely superb. If you loved "Trainspotting" and "Porno", then you'll probably revel in this prequel. By turns hilarious, appalling, and frequently both at the same time. It's also quietly profound too - Irvine Welsh gives Renton numerous opportunities to take a route out of addiction, but each time he reasons that heroin addiction is a rational response to the futility of the alternatives on offer in Thatcher's Britain, adn given his own personal history. The addict as the ultimate free spirited, non-conformist. That perhaps makes the book sound quite serious. It certainly has moments of profundity but is as much about Irvine Welsh's trademark hilarious, appalling, dark, witty, insightful set pieces, scams, and stories.

I bought this book to take on holiday and immediately had to divide the number of pages by the number of days I had on holiday as I had to ration myself reading it. If I hadn't I would have finished it too quickly and would have had no reading material left! It is ironically addictive: Irvine Welsh does not disappoint on the humour or horror aspects for which he is known and loved. I felt that I had the characters on holiday with me and was almost lonely when the book was done. I loved every bit of it and for any Irvine Welsh fans out there, you will not be let down.

Just when I thought I had read everything he could throw at me and not be shocked, horrified or want to run and hide. I am halfway through Skag and have just gasped out loud, put the book down and had to have a quiet minute to myself. I truly loathe Sick Boy in this book and if and when you do get mid way and read what I have just read, you will too. IW is a writing genious, capable of bringing you to the lowest depths of misery within his pages... and then it gets worse.

Skagboys is a worthy prequel in the 'Trainspotting' trilogy and a five star read. In the novel the exploits of its now famous four characters (Rents, Sick Boy, Spud and Begbie) come of age in the Thatcherite dystopia of early 1980s working class Edinburgh. Welsh's characters face a world of tough choices, unemployment, drugs and generational poverty with a headlong rage that is the authors trademark. The hardback books hefty 548 pages highlights the family friends and developing `love interests' of the principal characters as they move, mate and scheme from the Port of Leith and into the wider world. Skagboys is vintage Welsh, with some of the best characterisation to date of his anti heroes at work rest and play. The novel is at times sad, bad, hilarious and profound with imagery and dialogue that's pure catnip to the converted/perverted Welsh reader.

Having just penned a review of another Scottish writer's latest (Iain Banks), and slated it for Banks coming out with a formula that's now somewhat tired, why do I rate this work so highly ? After all, it's just a return to the story that made him as a writer, with drugs, sex, violence and crime high on the agenda.

Yes, it is all of those things; however the initial characters were so well-penned, that having them back is a welcome return.

I was sad when I finished the book because even if Welsh writes a sequel to "Porno" (and to be honest, let's hope he doesn't) there's nothing more to be added to the tale. Renton, Sick Boy, Begbie and Spud will live on for ever as characters however, and this book is a valedictory farewell to them from a writer who has a unique voice and a great gift.

As other reviews have noted, this is an excellent return to form by Irvine Welsh. I thought Trainspotting was a wonderful book - well written, funny, dark, intelligent. I've bought most of his other books on the strength of this, but have been disappointed by them all to a greater or lesser extent when compared to his first. As for Porno - the sequel to Trainspotting - I have read this and thought it was "ok" but to be honest can't remember much about it now (a few years later).

Skagboys is very different and I think it compares favourably to Trainspotting. Using the same set of characters and mostly the same format it looks at Renton, Sickboy, Spud, Begbie et al around the mid eighties and specifically how most of them turn to heroin use and it's impact on them and others. It's told with great panache and uses Welsh's now-familiar transliterating of Leith slang for most of the characters. As with Trainspotting chapters are not always told by Renton, although most are. And as with Trainspotting this is not for the faint-hearted - I felt physically sick on three seperate occasions reading this.

I've never used drugs, but Welsh seems to know what he's talking about and the tawdry scenes of drug use were so descriptive I almost felt I was using myself. He also gives us a lot of information about why Renton acts like he does - even if Renton himself is not really sure. Fans of Begbie (and I am one) will be pleased to know he is still very much a big part of the story, as is Sickboy. The trick here is to make us like and care for people who do such horrible things to themselves and each other and Welsh succeeds admirably, even thought we know that everyone is in Trainspotting and how they act in that. But this book spurred me to revisit Trainspotting and you can't really see the gap between the end of Skagboys and the start of Trainspotting.

Fans of the original who have perhaps been put off (like me especially by Porno) will not be disappointed. It makes the whole idea of a prequel vital and essential.