BACK LIST
Michael Moorcock ((iollancz £2.95). Moorcock has distilled his thoughts on fantasy over the last 25 years and after reading them I am not surprised he has moved so far from the field in which he made his name. liven authors he likes and admires he damns with faint praise. and most he simply ignores in order to avoid having to express an opinion on them. Widely read. the prejudices he expresses are bound to provoke argument and readers will want to see what he has to say about their particular favourites.
(M. ('aldcr)
JUST PUBLISHED
I Does Khaki Become You?: The Militarization of Women's Lives ('ynthia linloe (Pandora £5.95) New edition of feminist classic which exposes the patriarcluil military's dependence on ‘feminine‘ women v- as army wives. prostitutes. nurses and defence workers.
(’omprehensiv e coverage of male violence reaching beyond the Forces.
I The Illustrated Dictionary of Music .Iohn Burke (Sphere £9.99) A to 7. of people. terminology. instruments and their history. places and the rest. It includes modern (ie of this century) jaH legends. opera singers and the Beatles. but not the born-again Iilv is Presley.
I The Illustrated Dictionary of Western Literature Michael Legal (Sphere £9.99) Writers. movements and literary terms are entered. (iood basic guide to the Big Names. with dates. a bit of biog. and plenty of good photos and illustrations. Perhaps feminism is too modern a movement to be admitted. Still structuralism and deconstruction aren‘t in evidence either. But existentialism is.
I A New Book or Dubliners to. Ben Forkner ( Methuen £4.95) Following in the wake ofJoyce. 15 short stories are here assembled which give us more of modern (ie 20th century) Dublin. Writers familiar (Beckett. Joyce) have their pennysworth as do the less known.
Published during Scottish Book Fortnight:
I The Patter, Another Blast Michael Munro ((‘anongate £3.95) Sequel to best-selling ‘The Patter'. with nifty illustrations by John Byrne. Interestingly.99’é (in my estimation ) of the words listed are insults.
I New Writing Scotland (No 6) edited by (‘arl MacDougall. Lidwin Morgan and Hamish Whyte (Association for Scottish Literary Studies £5.95) This year‘s selection contains the previously unpublished short stories and poems of-IS Scottish writers.
I The Pictish Trail Anthony Jackson (The ()rkney Press £3.95) Eleven journeys mapped out in pursuit of Pictish stones and forts which is about all that is known of the Picts (other than that they were sensibly matrilinear).
I Exodus to Altord Stanley Robertson
(Balnain Books £7.95) Tales of travelling people. with each colourful character telling his or her own story in Robertson‘s individual language. Illustrated by Simon Fraser.
I Nannie: A Life of Devotion Mora Dickson (Lochar Publishing £6.95) (‘harts child-Mora's possessiveness and love. the growth ofthe charges and the eventual displacement of Nannie.
I The King‘s Jaunt: George IV in Scotland 1822 .lohn I’rebble ((‘ollins £15) The visit occasioned the beginning of full-blown tartanization (thanks to Sir Walter Scott's pageant). Inane (ieorge hirnselfgets a good pen-nib in the ribs from I’rebble.
I Villages of Glasgow Aileen Smart (John Donald £6.95) Volume One looks at the villages in the north side of the city — their growth. community-basis and identity.
I St Kilda (‘olin Baxter and .lim (’rumley ((‘olin Baxter £12.95) More snaps from the mist and soft-focus man. this time of island landscapes.
More Scottish Books
I Watch-Man Ian Rankin (Bodley
I lead £10.95) Professional spy and disaster—area Miles Flint has a hard time of it. fluffing jobs and being pursued by rabid journalists.
I It Gets Better After Cairo 'I‘rialy ('ulross ( Fbury Press £12.95) Trying to get away from it all led (‘ulross out of the frying pan into the proverbial fire. .»\dventures round the world on
ROOTING OUT MORE WINNERS
The Scotsman-sponsored Saltire Society Short Leets are as follows: THE SCOTTISH BOOK OF THE YEAR Neal Ascherson (iames \viih Shadows (Radius)
Alan Bold MacDiarmid (John Murray)
Douglas Dunn Northlight (Faber and Faber)
Robin Jenkins.) ust Duffy ((‘anongatc)
Norman MacCaig \'oicc-( )ver ((‘hatto and Windus)
Tom Nairn The linchanted (ilass (Radius)
Muriel Spark A Far (‘ry From Kensington (Constable)
THE SCOTTISH BEST FIRST BOOK OF THE YEAR
Ian Abbot Avoiding the (iods (Chapman)
John Burnside The Hoop ((‘arcanet) John J. Graham Shadowed Valley (Shetland Publishing (‘o)
Robbie Kydd Auld Zimmcry (Mariscat Press)
Candia McWilliam A (‘ase of Knives (Bloomsbury)
Raymond Vettese The Richt Noise (Macdonald)
Winners will be announced on 1 November. Prizes are 21500 tor the Scottish Book or the Year and £1000 for the Best First Book._
journey of self-discovery. I Walk, Don’t Walk (iordon Williams (Richard Drew £3.95) ()bscure Scottish writer Graham (‘ameron is launched in America and America hits back. Novel which doesn't do much for the lmozing-writer myth ('.’).
I Sea Music David Profumo (Seeker ck Warburg £10.95) Iivocative tale of young boy's summer holiday on a Scottish island and his involvement with locals.
I Northlight Douglas Dunn (Faber and Faber £3.95)'I’he latest mixed poetry bag from Whitbread prize-winner.
I Dead Man's Chest Nicholas Rankin (Faber £4.95) (‘ombines travel with biography and autobiography as the author retraces the footsteps of Rl.S. Elegant. informative and moving.
I Loch Ness Richard Frere (John Murray £12.95) Sober study of the deep loch. its history. geology and legends. including a debunking chapter on the log that‘s masquerading as a monster.
I Charles Edward Stewart: A Irageuy in Many Acts Frank McLynn (Routledge £24.95) Stout biography of the would-be king. Vivid. tragic. indispensable.
I File John (iifford (Penguin £17.95) The latest in the admirable ‘The Buildings of Scotland‘ series. .\'ot as copiously illustrated as it might be but the text is scholarly. occasionally disgruntled and frequently illuminating.
I Northlight Douglas Dunn (Faber £3.95) Not a homogeneous collection like Iflegies but this still ranks as one of his best with poems which dwell on his return to Scotland. his love of the sax. friends (Philip Larkin and Jack Brogan) and his experience of abroad.
I Robert Burns Richard Ilindle Fowler ( Routledge £19.95) Latest biog of the bard. stiff and self—conscious in parts but good agriculturally and anatomically.
I The Beatles Anniversary Special (ieoffrey Stokes ( W.H. Allen £8.95) I McCartney—The Biography ( ‘het Flippo (Sidgwick 8; Jackson “4.95). It's twenty—five years since the Beatles' first NumberOne and that. I suppose. is as good a reason as any for another book. This one may look groaningly predictable — large print and a plethora of photographs — but those who survive the rabid Bernstein introduction maybe pleasantly surprised. Stokes presents an interesting. vigorous and mainly accurate account of the Fab Four which is ideal for the casual fan or the young convert. However. its scope is limited so serious Beatlologists should go for Flippo‘s book instead. This is dedicated to both Lennon and McCartney and it is. essentially. about ‘John and Paul'. While providing a competent analysis of their relationship. Flippo never quite gets to grips with McCartney ‘thc man‘ — due mainly to the notorious reluctance of the millionaire
singer songwriter to spill any beans. Still. it makes absorbing reading.
Albert Goldman has with Lennon. but he is not shy about delving into the less savoury side of Mr Mop-top. Despite its strange mixture of laconic flippancy and genuine respect. this is a successful grapple with the Beatles myth and as hottest a picture of McCartney as we are likely to get. (Ursula Paton)
I The Patter: Another Blast Michael Munro ((‘anongate £3.95) The first blast (‘A taste or portion of something. particularly ofalcoholic drink: “See‘s another blast a that malt. big yin." ‘) of this lexicon of Glasgowspeak clocked up over 100.000 sales and it's odds on that Mk 2 will be similarly successful. In a disingenuous. somewhat irrelevant introduction the author tries to explain why Glasgow has coined such a rich and inimitable
vocabulary. He fails. But he is in his element when providing examples to illustrate his definitions to words which may not all belong to Glasgow but which reek of its less salubrious quarters. It is a browsers delight and its pseudo-serious posture plays into the hands of the comic like a straight man in a double act. To quote randomly is futile. It is a book to be read in situ. to be brandished like a Baedeker and to be kept as a reminder of the Glasgow that you can still find ifyou venture offthe beaten pedestrian precint. It is iIIUstrated. idiosyncratically. by John Byrne. (David (.‘rozier)
SCOTTISH BOOK FORTNIGHT
Due to the usual space constraints. these listings are not comprehensive. Authors who are putting in appearances. but who are not mentioned below include: Mollie Weir. Bruce Sandison. Moira Miller. Alistair Dunnctt. Jimmy Black. Rikki Fulton. Gordon Menzies and many more. Contact the Scottish Book Marketing Group on 031 225 5795 for more details.
I Paisley Book Fair ch 2-Sat 5 Nov. For details of author events etc. contact Renfrew District Libraries on 0-11 887 2468.
Glasgow
Thurs 27: Launch of Douglas Dunn‘s ‘Northlight' and The Saltire Society‘s new edition ofGeorge (‘ampbell Hay's nautical poem
The List 28 Oct — 10 Nov 1988 59