List price: $13.95 USD
Amazon price: $11.16 USD
Another great book come movie. If you manage to get through the Scottish slang (there's a dictionary in the American edition) you'll find a somewhat jumbled story but very true to life. Yes, it is not a merry tale, it's a book about poverty, addiction and loss but also a story about those bonds that tie people together and make us human. Nevertheless, it is real and even though it might not appeal to everyone, it will to those who don't fear reality.
Amazon.com Book Review
Irvine Welsh's controversial first novel, set on the heroin-addicted fringe of working-class youth in Edinburgh, is yet another exploration of the dark side of Scottishness. The main character, Mark Renton, is at the center of a clique of nihilistic slacker junkies with no hopes and no possibilities, and only "mind-numbing and spirit-crushing" alternatives in the straight world they despise. This particular slice of humanity has nothing left but the blackest of humor and a sharpness of wit. American readers can use the glossary in the back to translate the slang and dialect--essential, since the dialogue makes the book. This is a bleak vision sung as musical comedy.