Marabou Stork Nightmares - Irvine Welsh

I remember, back in the heady days of 1995, thinking that 'Trainspotting' was just about the coolest book ever. However, recently, I have been thinking just how good it really was. Maybe, I was just swayed by the zeitgeist....maybe, I was just young and impressionable....maybe I just thought it was cool because it was about drugs. Anyway, this is besides the point. Up to a couple of weeks ago, I was convinced that Irvine Welsh was a one dimensional writer, with not a great deal to say, and a very outmoded way of saying it...........But that was a couple of weeks ago, and after reading 'Marabou Stork Nightmares', my opinion has drastically changed. ...  Read the complete review

Don't worry, I'm not going to spoil the tale! The Marabou Stork Nightmares is Irvine Welsh's second novel (but third book as The Acid House is a collection of short stories) and is another shining example of his literary genius. The story is a journey into the mind of Roy Strang, a twenty-something from a council scheme in Scotland. Roy is in a coma and tells his tale on three levels: 1) Reality as Roy knows it 2) Reality as we know it 3) The past 1) Reality as Roy knows it --------------------------------- The story starts with Roy's adventures of the mind. Most of this part of the tale is set in Africa as ...  Read the complete review

If you expect this book to be a fun, witty look at the British drug culture, then you're in for a BIG surprise! Although the title somewhat suggests a connection to absurd LSD trips, drugs only play a tiny part in the story. The book is mostly written in Scottish dialect, which might make it difficult to read (I personally got used to it very quickly, and at the time I first read it I was still living in Switzerland so it can't be too hard!), but once you get the hang of it - WOW! The story focuses on the life of Roy Strang, an outsider who grew up in a council estate in Scotland and comes from a somewhat weird and whacky family of nuts and ...  Read the complete review

Marabou Stork Nightmares is arguably Welsh's best work so far and it allows the reader to escape into the mind of quite a disturbed young man coming to terms with his mistakes. The style is unorthodox yet quite understandable and enjoyable. Roy Strang is in a coma. Roy Strang exists on 3 levels of consciousness. He has his 'almost waking self', who takes note of his hospital environment and visitors. There is his 'past self', where he reflects on his life up to the point that he entered the coma and there is the 'deep self', where he is hunting for the Maribou stork in South Africa, a task he takes very seriously. Roy constantly jumps ...  Read the complete review