Shuggie Bain

The 2020 Booker Prize Winner by Douglas Stewart.
Hailed by the judges as ‘A book of rare and lasting beauty’
It’s 1981, Glasgow. A time when all most people can do is dream of better times.
Shuggie’s mother is one, abandoned with three children and spiralling downwards in drink and the fog of despair.
Shuggie is her best hope, but his life isn’t exactly easy. He’s different, he doesn’t fit, he’s ‘No’right’, he’s picked on and bullied and really has enough to deal with just being Shuggie. His determination to be ‘normal’ in order to save his mother is heartbreaking, funny and brave. Ultimately this is a book that will find a place along side those of Frank McCourt, Roddy Doyle and Barry Hines, and Shuggie will surely become a character equal to any of their courageous misfits.