by Alan Warner
First published 2020
Slorach leads his gang of Glaswegian misfits on train journeys across northern England, feeding his addiction to gambling machines and pub crawls. This British Rail timetables expert disappoints his family while dragging his crew deeper into the world of quiz-machine gambling. Meanwhile in Edinburgh, Frank arrives home from prison for what may be his terminally ill mother's final Christmas, hoping to rebuild his life as an artist. His brother Joe shows up drunk, setting the stage for family secrets to explode during the holiday gathering. Across Europe, thousands of English football supporters descend on Brussels for a match against Belgium, watched by two media professionals with opposing politics but shared interests. A smaller group of football purists makes their way through Germany to join the chaos. As order collapses and authorities react with fury, the true nature of civilized behavior comes into question. These three novellas explore addiction, family bonds, and tribal loyalty through characters trapped between their desires and their circumstances.
Genres: literary-fiction, addiction, contemporary, family-drama
Vibes: emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: found-family, unreliable-narrator
Setting: Brussels, Edinburgh, England, Germany, Glasgow
Period: Christmas
288 pages · Paperback · London Books
Content warnings: addiction, alcohol-abuse, substance-abuse