Kevin Previn, post-punk playwright, returns to his native Glasgow after a ten-year absence, prompted by the death of a friend and mentor. Previn believes he is searching for clues to the troubled death of his old friend, yet it becomes apparent that he is engaged on a personal journey of discovery.
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
From Booklist
Researching a television project about his former friend and writer Mike Illingworth, London-based playwright and performance artist Kevin Previn returns to Glasgow, where his abusive childhood and subsequent years of decadence flood his memory. The recent death of Illingworth, a junkie and a victim of AIDS, leaves a hole in Kevin's life and prompts numerous questions about his own drug-filled, promiscuous past as well as his lost hope, love, and sense of identity. Graham deftly portrays a decaying city and culture. This is a bleak present filled with postpunk notions: cocaine and heroin addiction, welfare living, alcoholism, and general apathy. Graham's words are raw and gritty, and his observations unrelenting and brutally honest. Though this may be considered counterculture to some, The Book of Man is sadly real and deeply poignant. It is a book about strange friendship, youthful freedoms, perpetuated cycles of abuse, and the ripples of violence flowing through every level of society. Moreover, this book is about identifying our demons and accepting what role we play in their creation. Janet St. John
Review
"Haunting and evocative, The Book of Man resonates with the redemptive power art has over life" - Irvine Welsh
"One of the real literary finds"
"One of the real literary finds"
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More About the Author
Barry Graham is an author, screenwriter, poet, journalist and blogger whose dark and gritty urban novels have received international acclaim and whose reporting has helped more than one corrupt politician leave office. He has written for a diversity of magazines and newspapers, including Harper's, Flaunt, Parabola, Las Vegas Life, The Arizona Republic and Scotland on Sunday.
Born and dragged up in Glasgow, Scotland, he has traveled widely and is currently based in the U.S. His previous occupations include boxing and grave-digging. He is also a Zen monk, and serves as the Abbot of The Sitting Frog Zen Center. His book of Zen teachings, Kill Your Self: Life After Ego, was published in 2011. His latest novel, When It All Comes Down to Dust, was published in January 2012.
He has witnessed two executions in Florence, Arizona, at the invitation of the prisoners. His account of that experience won a FOLIO Silver Medal in the Best Single Article category, and is included in his nonfiction book Why I Watch People Die.
Barry Graham's other books include the novels The Wrong Thing, The Book of Man (chosen by the American Library Association as one of the best books of 1995), How Do You Like Your Blue-Eyed Boy? and Of Darkness and Light, the story collections Scumbo and Before, and a poetry collection, Traffic and Murder. His stories have been published in the anthologies Phoenix Noir, Send My Love and a Molotov Cocktail, Suspect Device and Intoxication. His short screenplay Holding Back the Dawn was produced in 2001.
In 2009, the French magazine Transfuge named Barry Graham one of the great "post-realist" authors. A collection of his fiction and nonfiction, Regarde Les Hommes Mourir, is published in French by 13th Note Editions. He is collaborating with French artist Vince Larue on a graphic novel, Dark Heat.
Born and dragged up in Glasgow, Scotland, he has traveled widely and is currently based in the U.S. His previous occupations include boxing and grave-digging. He is also a Zen monk, and serves as the Abbot of The Sitting Frog Zen Center. His book of Zen teachings, Kill Your Self: Life After Ego, was published in 2011. His latest novel, When It All Comes Down to Dust, was published in January 2012.
He has witnessed two executions in Florence, Arizona, at the invitation of the prisoners. His account of that experience won a FOLIO Silver Medal in the Best Single Article category, and is included in his nonfiction book Why I Watch People Die.
Barry Graham's other books include the novels The Wrong Thing, The Book of Man (chosen by the American Library Association as one of the best books of 1995), How Do You Like Your Blue-Eyed Boy? and Of Darkness and Light, the story collections Scumbo and Before, and a poetry collection, Traffic and Murder. His stories have been published in the anthologies Phoenix Noir, Send My Love and a Molotov Cocktail, Suspect Device and Intoxication. His short screenplay Holding Back the Dawn was produced in 2001.
In 2009, the French magazine Transfuge named Barry Graham one of the great "post-realist" authors. A collection of his fiction and nonfiction, Regarde Les Hommes Mourir, is published in French by 13th Note Editions. He is collaborating with French artist Vince Larue on a graphic novel, Dark Heat.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Friendship...,
This review is from: The Book of Man (Paperback)
...is the main theme of this plangent novel, set in Scotland's lower depths amidst the literal & spiritual wreckage left by the Thatcher era. The prose is beautiful, the characters warmly realized, & the experience, though sad, is also exhilarating.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Friendship...,
This review is from: The Book of Man (Kindle Edition)
...is the main theme of this plangent novel, set in Scotland's lower depths amidst the literal & spiritual wreckage left by the Thatcher era. The prose is beautiful, the characters warmly realized, & the experience, though sad, is also exhilarating.
2 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
This novel is an overlooked masterpiece!,
By
This review is from: Book Of Man (Paperback)
With two recent titles of Barry Graham's cancelled due to Incommunicado Press going, well, incommunicado, I'm dismayed to see this book fall out of print. Luckily, it's available used. Here Graham is at the top of his form, delivering brutality and hope at a relentless clip. There's nothing forced here, nothing false. Innovations in technique are employed towards a definite end, not just to look hip. The dialogue is perfect, the characters seem real, and I'm convinced after finishing it that if there is any justice in the world (and there is a little left) BOOK OF MAN will be remembered as one of the finest novels of the 90's.My only gripe? The cover design and the plot summary on the back make the book seem a lot more flip and dated than it is. And that's the publisher's fault, not Graham's, so I don't know why I'm bothering to mention it... Fans of writers like Irvine Welsh, Charles Bukowski, and Eileen Myles will find this riveting. It should be on the shelf of every aspiring fiction writer. It should be in print. It should be next on your list.
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