It is the Swinging Sixties and Kelvin Walker has moved from Scotland to London to make his fortune. Through his wanton ambition, a megalomania surfaces that is unrelieved by his insensitive attempts at friendship and romance. Yet is he all bad, or are the true villains the establishment figures who he tricks and deceives? And, ultimately, does it matter?
Gray’s twist on the follies of religion, the media and the imperial British centre is as relevant now as ever.
A parable, a romp and, as I found, a one-compulsive-sitting read -- MELVYN BRAGG
A necessary genius -- ALI SMITH
One of the brightest intellectual and creative lights Scotland has known in modern times -- NICOLA STURGEON
Gray is a true original, a twentieth century William Blake -
Observer -
The best Scottish novelist since Sir Walter Scott -- ANTHONY BURGESS
One of the most gifted writers to have put pen to paper in the English language -- IRVINE WELSH
Gray transformed our expectations of what Scottish literature could be -- VAL McDERMID -
Author
About Alasdair Gray
Alasdair Gray is an old asthmatic Glaswegian who lives by painting, writing and book design. In addition to Lanark, he is author of Unlikely Stories Mostly, 1982 Janine, The Fall of Kelvin Walker, Lean Tales (with James Kelman and Agnes Owens), Old Negatives (verse), McGrotty & Ludmilla, Something Leather, Why Scots Should Rule Scotland, Poor Things, The Ends of our Tethers and A Life in Pictures.
