It’s one of those experiences where I began to read the book and thought: “What the hell is this? This is awful. I don’t like this …” and then cautiously, mysteriously, something changes, you get drawn in and hooked ...
At this novel’s heart – as with all Kelman’s work – is an unfettered inner voice, a living consciousness in motion, pouring forth truth in all its undiluted generosity and continual inventiveness...
Guardian: Alan Warner reviews McCarthy's "The Road"
2006
Such a scenario allows McCarthy finally to foreground only the very basics of physical human survival and the intimate evocation of a destroyed landscape drawn with such precision and beauty...
Reading: the worlds within worlds of reading. There is a secret life of reading none of us talk about enough. When we go away from the world and sit and turn the pages...
When he meets fellow authors, Scottish novelist Alan Warner always tries to ferret out what they did before becoming writers. In his own case, the answer is simple...
I believe that when we try to understand writers we too often look in the wrong place. We try to understand them as personalities rather than considering the complex influences other books have upon them...
