First out of the bag was Bernard MacLaverty's The Anatomy School, picked up at a local charity shop recently for £1.50.
A passing acquaintance with the author (who was Writer-in-Residence at Aberdeen University in the mid eighties, when I was a student there), was enough to persuade me to take it home. He used to hang out in the Roman Catholic Chaplaincy,where students could find the best tea and coffee facilities, super ploughman's lunches and a great little library fitted out with study tables. I remember him as a genial, funny, down-to-earth kind of guy, who had experienced a normal life before taking up writing. If you don't know anything about him or his work, check out his website, where he has some amusing anecdotes, and a recommended reading list of personal favourites. www.bernardmaclaverty.com
I am heartened by the fact that he confesses to not reading much at all until adulthood. It seems to be the opposite way round for me. I read loads as a child, often stuff that I was too young to appreciate, but seem to have lost the appetite for reading in mid-life! Anyway, if The Times is right, this is going to be a "zestfully funny" novel. I'm twelve pages in so far, and enjoying the irreverent Catholic humour, especially the priests. Lets see how I get on between here and page sixty, where one reviewer says she got bored and gave up!
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