Skagboys

Mark Renton has it all: he's good-looking, young, with a pretty girlfriend and a bright future. But there's no room for him in the 1980s and when his family starts to fracture, Mark's life swings out of control. The way out is heroin. It's no better for his friends - Spud Murphy is paid off from his job, Tommy Lawrence finds sucked into a life of petty crime and violence and the world of the psychotic Franco Begbie. Only Sick Boy seems to ride the current, scamming and hustling his way through it all. Exhilarating and moving, "Skagboys" charts their journey from likely lads to young addicts in a decade which changed Britain forever. It was shortlisted for the Saltire Society Scottish Book Awards.