Making Memories
Unforgettable Reading
Unforgettable Reading
The new year is often a time for reflection and planning. And if you're after reading recommendations for 2020, you've come to the right place. This month BooksfromScotland looks at new books and new talent in fiction, poetry, memoir and childrens' books, and there is a lot to get excited about. So, get cosy, settle down and discover some new books to while away the rest of the winter. It's the perfect way to look forward to the new year.
Martin MacInnes
We’re very much looking forward to Martin MacInnes’s second novel, Gathering Evidence, after the success of his debut, Infinite Ground. He’s a writer who defies description, and likes to push boundaries in genre and form, while exploring ideas of technology, the environment and the world(s) we live in. In Gathering Evidence, ...
Pine By Francine Toon Published by Doubleday
If they ever make a film of Pine, Francine Toon’s debut novel, it will probably begin much the same way as her book. The opening shot will establish the setting: a village in a wooded Sutherland valley, with adults shepherding oddly dressed children from door to door. It’s Hallowe’en. Of course it is. When else would you want to set a Gothic novel?
We don’t need to notice too much about the villagers, but we’ll let the camera pan on their faces just long enough for us to recognise them in later scenes: a ceilidh, perhaps, or the hunt for a missing teenager. Most of the time, though, the film will focus on a ten-year-old girl called Lauren and try to work out what she makes of the world. Take, for example, th...
‘I found the body and I found the ants and I found the true face of my community and my culture as it is today. And I’m not going to accept it.’
The Book According to…Mark Douglas-Home
‘“Have you,” he said after consideration, as if proposing a soloution “ever had a crazy, stupid dream that, one day, someone will take you from here, will ask you to run away?”’
‘I adored Jane’s righteous fury, her wild passion, her sense of injustice: I absolutely identified with her.’
‘Something must change, I think, as the bell rings and rings and the fourth round starts. For the first time ever, I actually start to engage my boxing brain.’
‘My hiding place is not a cave. It is a shrine.’
‘Tom knew that he had not enjoyed that afternoon, or that morning, whichever it was, playing with Angus. He had thought of his mother the whole time, of how angry she must be, and worse, how hurt. Get …
‘After I gave birth to the twins, you surprised me with a feast of things I’d had to give up while pregnant: bubbly, Brie and prawns.’