by James Kelman
First published 1997
Sammy opens his eyes in a Glasgow alley on Sunday morning, piecing together fragments of a two-day drinking spree. The ex-convict and shoplifter stumbles into a confrontation with soldiers that lands him in jail, where he discovers something terrible: he can no longer see. The police have beaten him blind. When Sammy gets out, his girlfriend Helen has vanished without explanation. The authorities interrogate him relentlessly about the incident while he navigates Glasgow's streets with his new disability. He attempts to claim compensation through the welfare system, but bureaucrats trap him in endless paperwork and appointments. Officials demand proof, documentation, and testimony he cannot provide. Sammy fights to survive in a world designed to crush people like him, armed only with his street smarts and stubborn refusal to surrender. His struggle becomes a battle against systems that treat working-class Scots as expendable. The novel captures one man's determination to retain his dignity when everything else has been stripped away.
Genres: fiction, literary-fiction, crime, contemporary, social-issues, disability
Vibes: emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: gritty, social-commentary, underdog
Setting: Glasgow
Period: 20th-century
374 pages · Paperback · Vintage Publishing
Content warnings: ableism