It’s been a long road, but it has all been worth it. Click here to check out the latest issue of The Scruffy Dog Review. The Author Interview is with Marcus Sakey, author of THE BLADE ITSELF.
Also, we have the latest installments of SCOTLAND’S TREASURE and THE LITERARY ATHLETE and wonderful fiction and poetry.
Come on and check us out!
The Scruffy Dog Review Website is temporarily unavailable while we move servers. It should be up and running by the end of the day on Wednesday, April 23rd.
Scottish writing phenomenon JK Rowling told a court in New York this week, that plans to publish an unofficial Harry Potter encyclopaedia amounted to “wholesale theft”.
As a result of being embroiled in legal action against Steve Vander Ark and his publisher RDR Books, Rowling also stated she has had to stop work on her new novel because the action had “decimated my creative work”.
Rowling denied the case was anything to do with money, and accused Vander Ark of “an act of betrayal” in using her popular fantasy fiction series as the foundation for his book, The Harry Potter Lexicon. “He has simply taken it and copied it – it is sloppy, lazy and it takes my work wholesale,” she said.
Rowling also told the New York court she had intended to write her own encyclopaedia and donate the proceeds of its sales to charity.
In response to the action filed by Rowling’s solicitors, RDR Books accused the Scottish author of seeking to “claim a monopoly on the right to publish literary reference guides, and other non-academic research, relating to her own fiction”.
The case will be heard until the end of this week.
Related Links
www.jkrowling.com
www.rdrbooks.com
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Colin Galbraith writes articles and reviews on a wide variety of subjects. For more information please visit: Colin Galbraith Freelance
It’s official, and probably not all that surprising, but Irvine Welsh has finally decided to write another novel involving Renton, Sick Boy, and Spud.
The announcement that a prequel to Trainspotting is to be written comes 15 years after Welsh penned those first historic words: “The sweat wis lashing oafay Sick Boy; he wis trembling,” and 6 years after he released the sequel, Porno, which saw the characters trying their hand in the adult movie industry, as opposed to injecting heroin in and around Leith.
The new book will take the story back a couple of years before Trainspotting, which was set in mid-1980s Edinburgh, to chronicle the decline of the gang from young guys out for a laugh, to full-on drug addicts with real-life problems.
Fans of Welsh will be absolutely thrilled at the announcement, perhaps more so than the literary establishment in Scotland, which has long seen Welsh as an unqualified author who got lucky. But that has never bothered Welsh, who can quite easily point to a very popular publishing back catalogue, Hollywood success based on his writing, a backlog of literary projects, and of course, several million in the bank.
Welsh says he was prompted into making the decision after finding discarded material for Trainspotting in his attic. He explained: “The thing is basically a prequel and will be about how Renton and Sick Boy went from being daft, young guys just out for the buzz to total junkies. It focuses on them when they are a couple of years younger, and shows how their attitudes and behaviour start to change as they become more defined by the drug and the culture around it.
“I had a great deal of material that, for various reasons, namely pace and because it didn’t fit the time frame, wasn’t suitable for the previous books. There’s a particular section about Renton and Sick Boy’s first visit to London to stay with their friend Nicksy in Hackney that I always wanted to publish, but it was just a bit too long.
“The others are first and second drafts from 1991 based on the same diaries and notes as the original Trainspotting. I only found them as I’ve been looking through boxes that have been in the attic for years – and I thought they’d been slung out ages ago.”
Welsh’s latest novel, Crime, will be published in July and he also has an anthology of short stories due for publication in 2009.
Related Links
www.irvinewelsh.net
Colin Galbraith writes articles and reviews on a wide variety of subjects. For more information please visit http://freelance.colingalbraith.co.uk
An up-coming Scottish writer was handed a legal citation for libel yesterday, for using a friend’s name in a short story without permission.
Edinburgh-based Colin Galbraith, the author of several works of poetry and fiction, is being taken to court by his friend Craig Cameron, for using his name in a story entitled Blackpool Tower, in an anthology called, Tales from the Seaside, which aimed to celebrate the British fascination with the culture of seaside resorts through the medium of poetry and prose.
In the story, Cameron is portrayed as being “overly plump, with a penis so small one could easily mistake it for a leech that has attached itself to his genitals.”
Cameron said of his author friend: “We’ve been friends for over 20 years, but this is just not on. I’m not the biggest chap in the world – you know, down there – but I do like to think of myself as a bit of a lady pleaser. This will just ruin me. How can I ever show my face in Rosco’s Nightclub ever again?”
While Mr. Cameron’s comments may sound somewhat comical, the author of the piece failed to see the funny side. If found guilty of the offence, Galbraith could face a fine of up to £10,000 as well as a possible six months in prison.
Since the citation was issued, the publishers of the anthology, Smashing Press, have ordered the removal of all copies from bookshelves around the country, as well as those for sale on the Internet, until the matter has been resolved.
When asked to comment, Galbraith said: “If the matter gets to court there’s only one way to prove my innocence – I’ll ask him to get his dick out. Then the laugh will be on him.
“Cameron has a wee willy, it’s as simple as that. There’s no two ways about it.”
~ Colin Galbraith ~
www.colingalbraith.co.uk
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