Reviews

Really moving book about friendship and directing your own path. A book of two halves, setting up the friendship between Tully and Jimmy, two working class lads in 1980s Glasgow, then following them again 30 years later when Tully gets the news we all dread.

Yep you’re going to cry.

“𝘐 𝘤𝘰𝘶𝘭𝘥𝘯’𝘵 𝘴𝘢𝘺 𝘸𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘣𝘳𝘢𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘺 𝘪𝘴, 𝘣𝘶𝘵 𝘪𝘵 𝘮𝘶𝘴𝘵 𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘦𝘮𝘣𝘭𝘦 𝘴𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘭𝘪𝘬𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘸𝘢𝘺 [𝘩𝘦] 𝘳𝘦𝘮𝘢𝘪𝘯𝘦𝘥 𝘩𝘪𝘮𝘴𝘦𝘭𝘧.”

I imagine this books hits even harder if you were coming of age in the 80s, working class, deep into Joy Division, The Smiths, Brookside etc - it felt nostalgic to me and I didn’t even exist then 😅

Negatives? You might not like it if you crave fully realistic characters - that’s not to say that those within these pages don’t feel genuine and fleshed out, they truly do - but they are the sort of characters that rarely exist in real life, yet pervade in literature… authentic at the core, but wrapped up in a pretentious aesthetic cliche. As such the dialogue veers from believable to ‘artistic tool’. I think it captures that sense of being working class, bookish, studious, and wanting more from life well - feeling tied to a future whilst simultaneously having the freedom to nothing of lose if you leap. But it articulates it the voice of someone who made that intellectual creative social mobility climb, retrospectively inserting that voice onto the youth at the bottom.

Over all a good book, and I look forward to reading more of his work, but I feel it needed ‘something’ to elevate it to great (to make up for the aforementioned authenticity issue). Maybe if the first and second sections had been intertwined, flashbacks for greater juxtaposition and highlighting of those lasting bonds of friendship.

confused_pigeon's review against another edition

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emotional medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No

4.5

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