Alan Parks was born in Scotland and attended The University of Glasgow where he was awarded a M.A. in Moral Philosophy. Bloody January is his debut novel.
At CrimeReads he tagged six crime "books that have nothing in common but the huge part the cities in which they are set play," including:
Louise Welsh, The Cutting RoomRead about another entry on the list.
Glasgow is a city which I’m very familiar. The best writers can make a familiar city, a new city, a place you think you know but you don’t. In The Cutting Room, Louise Welch simply carved out a new Glasgow. No hard men, no long-suffering women, no razor kings,no clichés about the city that run from the thirties until now.
Her hero Rilke is ostensibly an auctioneer, but he’s really a connoisseur of things. Of the feel of them, the patina from the people who have used them, the smell of them. It makes sense that the crime he becomes involved in is discovered through an object. A fading black and white photograph. The object rather than the flesh.
His Glasgow is one of faded grandeur and tightly kept secrets. No one is quite who they seem, including Rilke. His homosexuality, hidden from some, plain to others is like the city he lives in, half hidden in shadow and more complex than it seems. Welsh’s Glasgow is embodied in Rilke and it in him. It’s a perfect match.
The Cutting Room is among Sarah Lotz's eight novels featuring atypical amateur detectives and Irvine Welsh's five best crime novels.
--Marshal Zeringue
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