Where the Dead Men Go: Liam McIlvanney

Just got round to reading this,  second in what is being dubbed, breezily, 'Conway Trilogy 2', after an almost-quite-good-value £5 Kindle download. Just dear enough to annoy, just cheap enough to tempt. £12.99 reduced to nine quid for the paperback seems expensive too...

Anyway. I very much enjoyed All The Colours of The Town (see Thrillfilters passim) McIlvanney's debut thriller (Conway Trilogy 1) and wanted to find out what happened to Gerry Conway, ace Glasgow newshound and failing, guilt-ridden father. He's now getting another shot at fatherhood, with a new baby and a new New Zealandic bidie-in. He has, miraculously, become a PR man and then returned to what is clearly The Daily Record masquerading as The Herald. The book is nailed to 2011, oddly, and you would imagine from the negativity towards the medium of print that both those (real life) organs would be dead and buried by now. They're not, though McIlvanney's pessimisim regarding the future of newspapers, and his cynicism about their present, seems well founded, to me at least. Though if the Record and The Herald were to merge and become The Tribune, well...who knows?

What can I tell you about the plot? Jings. Murder, polis! Two rival gangland bigwigs fighting for supremacy. Corrupt council land deals and dodgy local politicians (hope McIlvanney had this properly legalled under Scots Law; there's some ready and uncomfortable identifiability with living local colour). A dead crime hack, Roma gangs in Govanhill. Paedophile prostitution. Grown-up prostitution. Assassins, Ulster terrorism and lashings of crisps and ginger beer! Actually, I meant malt whisky, wine and proper beer, old-school juicehead scribbler pubs, blues CDs and nice restaurants.

There is some brilliant descriptive writing but there's just a bit too much unlikely neon Taggartesque nonsense; things get cluttered and unconvincing towards the end. And the obsession with parenthood, lost children and fathers, inheritance and the visiting of second generation sins, becomes both distracting and in the end, a bit overwhelming. One minor detail: why is Glasgow and all its locii described with such loving, indeed moving accuracy, whereas Ayrshire's towns, coastal and inland, masquerade under pseudonyms?

I read this book a mere chucked brick from '27 Clouston Street', Gerry Conway's flat, loving the sense of place, the assured familiarity. I know present-day Govanhill a bit and I fear it was pantomimed slightly, the Roma issue somewhat caricatured. Kilmarnock and Prestwick were more than recognisable. Maybe Glasgow vibrates rather too colourfully throughout, and that is possibly a product of McIllvanney's southern hemisphere exile. Or Gerry Conway's prodigious appetite for booze, and nefarious habit of driving while well over the limit.

In conclusion: fascinating, not without its faults but addictive, stylish and just a wee bit too clever for its own good.

Hacks, heroes and hopefully avoiding legal action: the journalist as novelist and protagonist

Anyone who has ever been involved with the Scottish newspaper industry should undoubtedly beg, borrow, steal or otherwise obtain a copy of Matt Bendoris's first novel Killing with Confidence. I can promise that they will read it with tremendous enjoyment.

Unless - or maybe especially if -  they happen, lightly or heavily disguised, to be in it.

And striding colourfully through the book they may imagine they can identify more than the models for Bendoris's array of  hacks, former editors, editors, news editors, editorial secretaries, union reps and human resources managers. Cops, therapists, celebrities, businessmen and women, gangsters and restaurateurs - the full panoply of West Central Scotland tabloidism is here, some individuals more recognisable than others.

I trust that Bendoris's nose for a 'legal' - he is chief features writer for the Scottish Sun - will keep him out of trouble in the courts over this highly entertaining book - I certainly hope so. Some of the 'originals' are dead and as for others, well. I will say nothing more, other than I expect a few tweaks before the paperback version comes out in the summer. That's the great thing about Kindle releases: the editing process can be continuous.

There are some brilliant tropes in what is often reminiscent of Colin Bateman's early Ulster black farces (before he became just 'Bateman' and too easily confused with the protagonist of American Psycho): The serial killer Osiris, fuelled by American self-help CDs. The Jekyll and Hyde detective with Tourette's. The hilarious central character April Lavender and the Bendoris stand-in Connor 'Elvis' Presley.

 It feels slightly unfinished - the ending is rushed and the sense of scores being settled may be a little too strong for some. It's perhaps a stringent edit and a couple of more drafts away from being properly done and dusted. But as it stands, it's a great read, and less than three quid on your Kindle.

There are some great illustrations of pre- (and probably post-) Leveson tabloid tactics, and probably the best swearing and deep-fried food consumption I have experienced outside of John Niven's  wonderful The Amateurs.

Just beware, though if you have a Paperwhite: My version loaded the book to start four chapters from the end. Which kind of spoilt the whodunnit element when I finally realised and started at the beginning...