Jill
> Yes, I've read two of Brookmyre's novels - A Big Boy Did It and Ran
> Away - which would have to be one of the best title's ever and a jolly
> good read (though I read it sometime in late September 2001 which made
> me do a wee bit of a double take) - and The Secret Art of Stealing,
> which I enjoyed as well but thought it went a bit 'soft' somewhere
> along the line.
Tut, tut, Jill (typical bloody woman, he muttered under his breath, misquote
at the drop of a handbag), it's +The Sacred [sic] Art of Stealing+ <g>.
It was the first I read, and I'd agree with you that it goes a bit soggy,
though I find the beginning quite hysterically funny. And you're right,
that is set in Glasgow -- specifically begins with a bank job in Argyle
Street. The Glasgow-Pakistani policewoman heroine (and I seem to have
misplaced my copy for the moment and I can never remember her name) occurs
in Big Boy as well (and I think in one other novel, not sure on this
though), so you're right on this, both these are Glasgow.
The Edinburgh ones feature the journalist Jack Parlabane.
> To my completely uneducated ear they both seemed and claimed to be
> Glaswegian and The Secret Art ... told me all I needed to know, and
> quite a bit more, about the Celtic v Rangers thing.
<g> That wee polis girl does tend to go on about the Old Firm, doesn't she?
> Doesn't Brookmyre live, or once live in Aberdeen? D'you think that
> might explain something? Some of my lot did originally come from there,
> so I hope that's not stretching the noiceness too far.
I know he worked as a journalist in both Glasgow and Edinburgh, but you
might be right about the Aberdeen connection.
His homesite is here:
http://www.brookmyre.co.uk/index.htm
Anyone who wants a sense of what Jill and I are on about without actually
going out to buy a book might check this:
http://www.brookmyre.co.uk/bampota.htm
(It's the first of the Parlabane Stories, Jill, and also sort-of a seed for
The Whatsit of Stealing.)
Then there's Ian Rankin and the Rebus novels, and those certainly *are*
Edinburgh -- lots of detail about the city, and linguisticaly light, not
dialect.
Robin
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