Reheated Cabbage: Tales of Chemical Degeneration
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- $10.99
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- $10.99
Publisher Description
Never-collected tales, including outrageous early stories from the Trainspotting years, plus a raucous new novella.
Reheated Cabbage gathers stories showcasing Irvine Welsh’s trademark skills: vaulting imagination, brilliant vernacular ear, scabrous humor, and the ability to create some of the most memorable characters in contemporary fiction. You can enjoy Christmas dinner with Begbie at his Ma’s and see how he greets his sister’s boyfriend and news of their engagement. You’ll discover in “The Rosewell Incident” why aliens speak hardcore Scots English and plan to put Midlothian roughs in charge of the planet. And you’ll be delighted to welcome back “Juice” Terry Lawson and now internationally famous DJ Carl Ewart, and watch them as they meet an old nemesis, retired schoolmaster Albert Black, under the strobe lights of a Miami Beach nightclub. These stories, most first published in small magazines and out-of-print anthologies, are all wildly offbeat and will delight both fans of and newcomers to Welsh’s world.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Welsh returns to the world of drug-ingesting, lager-swigging and "fitba"-loving Scotsmen in this hilarious collection from his Trainspotting years. The material may be old, but the slang still sings in these stories of scrappers attempting to become lords of whatever tiny domain they can conquer. There's Trainspotting's volatile Begbie, at his mom's house for Christmas and trying to endure his sister's new beau in "Elpseth's Boyfriend." In "A Fault on the Line," Malky doesn't want to let anything not even a horrific accident stop him from missing the kickoff of a footie match. These stories of blustering, emotionally befuddled men and the luckless women who love them also includes less traditional (for Welsh) fare, like "The Rosewell Incident," in which an alien race learns about Earth culture from a Scottish hood, and "I Am Miami," about a retired Scottish school teacher who runs into a pair of disgruntled former pupils in Miami. Welsh shines most brilliantly when portraying his solipsistic Scots head-butting the rock-hard ceiling in hopes of escaping, be it through booze, drugs, soccer or sex, from a violent world that offers little peace but plenty of humor.
Customer Reviews
Some Spice in the Cabbage
“Reheated Cabbage” had some good stories and some lesser ones and one I just couldn’t get into enough to read the whole thing.
My favorite one was “I Am Miami,” bringing back some of my favorite Welsh characters, Carl “N-Sign” Ewart and Terry “Juice” Lawson. It’s told from the perspective of one of their old school teachers, who’s sort of unhappily living in Miami, long after his retirement and his wife’s passing. He just happens to bump into Carl and Terry, who are in Miami for a party…
Of course, any story or chapter of a story with Terry Lawson is going to be fun, he’s simply a hardcore, fun-loving guy.
“I Am Miami” was worth the price of the book alone.
The story, “State of the Party” was pretty good, too, with a couple of characters, Crooky and Calum, taking drugs in a bar and going to a party with some serious mishaps that get them kicked out of the party onto the street.
I also enjoyed “Victor Spoils” and “Elspeth’s Boyfriend” the latter of which starred Frank Begbie ruining his family’s Christmas dinner because he doesn’t like his sister, Elspeth’s new boyfriend.
“A Fault on the Line” was a completely shocking story about a man who doesn’t care about much of anything except drinking and football.
The remaining stories I didn’t enjoy all that much.
There was definitely some spice in the, uh, reheated cabbage to keep it from being bland and boring.