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Irvine Welsh

Born: 1958 in Leith, Edinburgh, Scotland
Pen Name: None

Connection to Illinois: Irvine Welsh came to town for Columbia College’s Story Week several years back, he later returned for a visiting professor tour and, somewhere in the process, met and married a young Chicagoan and made Chicago his home.

Biography: Irvine is a contemporary Scottish novelist, best known for his novel Trainspotting. He has also written plays, screenplays, and directed several short films.


Awards:

Primary Literary Genre(s): Fiction

Primary Audience(s): Adult readers

Website: http://irvinewelsh.net
Irvine Welsh on WorldCat : http://www.worldcat.org/search?q=irvine+welsh


Selected Titles

  A decent ride :
ISBN: 0385540892 OCLC: 910294043

"Irvine Welsh returns to Edinburgh, the home of Trainspotting and so many of his novels since, with a new novel featuring one of his most iconic and beloved characters 'Juice' Terry Lawson that's thick on the Scottish brogue, heavy on the filth and masterful in its comedic timing. A Decent Ride sees Irvine Welsh back in Edinburgh, this time with one of his most compelling and popular characters front and center: the rampaging force of nature that is 'Juice' Terry Lawson, first seen in Glue. Juice is a man who contains multitudes: he's a top shagger, drug-dealing, gonzo pornstar and taxi driver. As we ride along in Juice's cab through the depraved streets of Edinburgh, Juice encounters a series of charmingly filthy characters, each of whom present their own, uh, unique challenges. Has he finally met his match in Hurricane 'Bawbag'? Can he discover the fate of the missing beauty, Jinty Magdalen, and keep her idiot-savant lover, the man child Wee Jonty, out of prison? Will he find out the real motives of unscrupulous American businessman and reality-TV star, Ronald Checker? And, crucially, will Juice be able to negotiate life after a terrible event robs him of his sexual virility, and can a new fascination for the game of golf help him to live without. a decent ride? (The meaning of the title is starting to sink in now, huh?). So buckle your seatbelts and prepare for one unforgettable ride"--

Acid house
ISBN: 8882463141 OCLC: 797391659

Guanda, Parma : 2001.

Crime :
ISBN: 9780393335507 OCLC: 286487630

Having been placed on leave after suffering an emotional meltdown, Edinburgh detective Ray Lennox and Trudi, his fiance, fly to Miami for a few days to relax and plan their wedding, but from the start the trip is a nightmare. Lennox gobbles antidepressants and begins drinking again in a desperate frenzy, but things really tilt out of control when he parties with some locals, who reacquaint him with an old obsession, cocaine. One of his new 'friends' has a 10-year-old daughter, who's been targeted by an organized ring of pedophiles. Can Lennox save the girl and redeem himself?--

Glue
ISBN: 9781407018072 OCLC: 501967204

Vintage, London : 2002.

The story of four boys growing up in the Edinburgh projects, Glue is about the loyalties, the experiences, and the secrets that hold friends together through three decades.

Glue /
ISBN: 0393322157 OCLC: 46671177

Norton, New York : 2001.

"The story of four boys growing up in the Edinburgh projects, Glue is about the loyalties, the experiences, and the secrets that hold friends together through three decades. The boys become men: Juice Terry, the work-shy fanny-merchant, with corkscrew curls and sticky fingers; Billy, the boxer, driven, controlled, playing to his strengths; Carl, the Milky Bar Kid, drifting along to his own soundtrack; and the doomed Gally, exceedingly thin-skinned and vulnerable to catastrophe at every turn."

If you liked school, you'll love work--
ISBN: 9781448129157 OCLC: 932012235

Mickey Baker, an ex-pat English bar owner living in Spain, returns to England to see his daughter and mother but must face the wrath of his ex-wife, a woman who pulls no punches. Part of the Storycuts series, this short story was previously published in the collection If You Liked School, You'll Love Work.

If you liked school, you'll love work-- /
ISBN: 039333077X OCLC: 122974241

W.W. Norton, New York : ©2007.

A collection of five short pieces includes "Rattlesnakes," in which three young Americans lost in the desert are accosted by two armed Mexicans, and "The DOGS of Lincoln Park," in which a Korean chef and Chicago socialite bond over a missing dog.

Marabou stork nightmares
ISBN: 9781407019390 OCLC: 897512367

The making of a Scottish hooligan. He is Roy Strang, whose mother was a prostitute, the father a ruffian, and there was a pedophile uncle who played with him. He gets into wrong company, stabs a schoolmate, gang rapes a girl and becomes famous. One day he gets his just deserts. The tale is told in flashbacks as he lies in hospital in a coma.

Marabou stork nightmares :
ISBN: 0393315630 OCLC: 36429347

W.W. Norton, New York : 1997, ©1995.

The making of a Scottish hooligan. He is Roy Strang, whose mother was a prostitute, the father a ruffian, and there was a pedophile uncle who played with him. He gets into wrong company, stabs a schoolmate, gang rapes a girl and becomes famous. One day he gets his just deserts. The tale is told in flashbacks as he lies in hospital in a coma. By the author of The Acid House.

Porno /
ISBN: 0393324508 OCLC: 50065152

W.W. Norton, New York : 2002.

Ten years after the events detailed in "Trainspotting", Simon Williamson, a.k.a. Sick Boy, is back in Edinburgh to direct and produce a porn film along with university student Nikki Fuller-Smith and old friend Mark Renton.

Reheated cabbage
ISBN: 9780099506997 OCLC: 619068942

Vintage, London : 2010.

Reheated cabbage :
ISBN: 0393338029 OCLC: 317919488

W.W. Norton, New York : 2009.

"Reheated Cabbage" is a new collection of old Irvine Welsh stories, many no longer in print, illustrating all his signature skills - brutal humour, and ear finely turned to the vernacular and, of course, unforgettable characters.

  Skagboys
ISBN: 9781448122943 OCLC: 970694926

Mark Renton has it all: he's good-looking, young, with a pretty girlfriend and a place at university. But there's no room for him in the 1980s. Thatcher's government is destroying working-class communities across Britain, and the post-war certainties of full employment, educational opportunity and a welfare state are gone. When his family starts to fracture, Mark's life swings out of control and he succumbs to the defeatism which has taken hold in Edinburgh's grimmer areas. The way out is heroin.It's no better for his friends. Spud Murphy is paid off from his job, Tommy Lawrence feels himself being sucked into a life of petty crime and violence - the worlds of the thieving Matty Connell and psychotic Franco Begbie. Only Sick Boy, the supreme manipulator of the opposite sex, seems to ride the current, scamming and hustling his way through it all.Skagboys charts their journey from likely lads to young men addicted to the heroin which has flooded their disintegrating community. This is the 1980s: a time of drugs, poverty, AIDS, violence, political strife and hatred - but a lot of laughs, and maybe just a little love; a decade which changed Britain for ever. The prequel to the world-renowned Trainspotting, this is an exhilarating and moving book, full of the scabrous humour, salty vernacular and appalling behaviour that has made Irvine Welsh a household name.

Skagboys /
ISBN: 0393088731 OCLC: 783160296

W.W. Norton, New York : 2012.

Chronicles the misadventures of Mark Renton and his friends as they cope with economic uncertainties, family problems, drug use, and the opposite sex in 1980s Edinburgh.

  T2 trainspotting
ISBN: 1784704733 OCLC: 971053634

Ten years on from Trainspotting Sick Boy is back in Edinburgh after a long spell in London. Having failed spectacularly as a hustler, pimp, husband, father and businessman, Sick Boy taps into an opportunity which to him represents one last throw of the dice. However, to realise his dream of directing and producing a pornographic movie, Sick Boy must team up with old pal and fellow exile Mark Renton. Still scheming, still scamming, Sick Boy and Renton soon find out that they have unresolved issues to address concerning the unhinged Frank Begbie, the troubled, drug-addled Spud, but, most of all, with each other.

The acid house /
ISBN: 0393312801 OCLC: 31207275

"Irvine Welsh's scintillating, disturbing, and altogether outrageous collection of stories—the basis for the 1998 cult movie directed by Paul McGuigan"--

The bedroom secrets of the master chefs
ISBN: 9780393064537 OCLC: 68965662

W.W. Norton, New York : 2006.

This story of two men locked in a war of wills that threatens their very existence is vintage Irvine Welsh. Troubled restaurant inspector Danny Skinner is on a quest to find the mysterious father his mother will not identify. Unraveling this hidden information is the key to understanding the crippling compulsions that threaten to wreck his young life. His ensuing journey takes him from the festival city of Edinburgh to the foodie city of San Francisco. But the hard-drinking, womanizing Skinner has a strange nemesis in the form of mild-mannered fellow inspector Brian Kibby. It is Skinner's unfathomable, obsessive hatred of Kibby that takes over everything, threatening to destroy not only Skinner and his mission but also those he loves most dearly. When Kibby contracts a horrific, undiagnosable illness, Skinner understands that his destiny is inextricably bound to that of his hated rival, and he is faced with a terrible dilemma. Irvine Welsh's work is a transgressive parable about the great obsessions of our time: food, sex, and celebrity.--Publisher's website.

The bedroom secrets of the master chefs /
ISBN: 0393329666 OCLC: 166289302

W.W. Norton, New York : 2007, ©2006.

The sex lives of siamese twins :
ISBN: 0804173214 OCLC: 886381402

When Lucy Brennan, a Miami Beach personal-fitness trainer, disarms an apparently crazed gunman chasing two frightened homeless men along a deserted causeway at night, the police and the breaking-news cameras are not far behind. Within hours, Lucy becomes a hero. Her celebrity is short-lived, though: the 'crazed gunman, ' turns out to be a victim of child sexual abuse and the two men are serial pedophiles. The solitary eye-witness, the depressed and overweight Lena Sorenson, thrilled by Lucy's heroism and decisiveness, becomes obsessed with the trainer and enrolls as a client at her Bodysculpt gym. It quickly becomes clear that Lena is more interested in Lucy's body than her own.--

Trainspotting
ISBN: 9780099465898 OCLC: 61216869

Vintage, London : 2004.

A jarring, fragmented ride through the dark underbelly of Edinburgh, the festival city. There is not an advocate, a festival performer or a fur coat in sight as, with bitter passion and rancid humour, Welsh lays bare the lives of this ill-starred bunch of addicts, alcoholics and no-hopers.

Trainspotting /
ISBN: 0393314804 OCLC: 34558739

W.W. Norton, New York : 1996.

Trainspotting is the novel that launched the sensational career of Irvine Welsh - an authentic, unrelenting, and strangely exhilarating group portrait of blasted lives in Edinburgh that has the linguistic energy of A Clockwork Orange and the literary impact of Last Exit to Brooklyn. Rents, Sick Boy, Mother Superior, Swanney, Spuds, and Begbie are as unforgettable a clutch of rude boys, junkies, and nutters as readers will ever encounter.

 

 

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