Rodge Glass

A lads' weekend in Eastern Europe spirals out of control. A bleeding tourist is rescued by a stranger in downtown Toronto. A middle-aged woman holidaying in Tunisia considers the local options for love. An unemployed man shares his fantasies of a sex tour of Arizona with his long-suffering girlfriend. A woman is drawn into an impromptu but life-changing football game in the heart of the Amazon. Following his universally acclaimed third novel, Bring Me the Head of Ryan Giggs, Somerset Maugham Award-winner Rodge Glass has created a themed, contemporary story collection like no other. With wit, wisdom, insight and pathos, he examines men and women of all ages who, through the advent of discount air travel, play out their lives and loves across the globe. Glass brilliantly captures the isolation, dislocation and occasional epiphanies of those who find themselves a thousand miles from home, and those who long to be.

Love Sex Travel Musik

Elizabeth Reeder

Helen Pleasance

 Kapka Kassabova

 John I MacArtney

Katie Karnehm

Rebecca Gordon Stewart

Rhiannon Marks

Jo Collinson Scott

Erin Soros

Writers of creative non-fiction are often expected to be able to recreate reality, to deal with, or even access, a singular truth. But the author, like any human, is not an automaton remotely tasked with capturing a life or an event. Whether we tell stories and understand them as fiction or non-fiction, or whether we draw away from these classifications, writers craft and shape writing all writing. No experience exists on a flat plane, and recounting or interpreting events will always involve some element of artistic manipulation: every instance, exchange, discussion, event is open to multiple interpretations and can be described in many ways, all of which are potentially truthful. Writing Creative Non-Fiction: Determining the Form contains essays and original writing from novelists, poets, songwriters, musicians and academics. The book covers topics that range from explorations of the role of the author, definitions and representations of the form, self and illness, to the spectral elements of non-fiction and its role in historical narratives. The essays included in this volume address everything from memoir, biography and autobiography to a discussion of musical approaches to criticism and a non/fiction interview. The book identifies key writers including Christopher Isherwood, David Shields, B. S. Jonson, James Frey, Åsne Seierstad, John D'Agata, W. G. Sebald, Jonathan Coe, Hilary Mantel, James Kelman, Liz Lochhead and Arthur Frank and is essential reading for students, researchers and writers of creative non-fiction. Contents Notes on Contributors Pathways to Determining Form Laura Tansley and Micaela Maftei A Bulgarian Journey Kapka Kassabova At the Will of Our Stories John I MacArtney She and I: Composite Characters in Creative Non-Fiction Katie Karnehm More Lies Please: Biography and the Duty to Abandon Truth Rodge Glass Ghosts of the Real: The Spectral Memoir Helen Pleasance One doesn t have much but oneself : Christopher Isherwood s Investigation into Identity and the Manipulation of Form in The Memorial Rebecca Gordon Stewart Menna, Martha and Me: The Possibilities of Epistolary Criticism Rhiannon Marks An Introduction to Schizoanalysis : The Development of a Musical Approach to Criticism Jo Collinson Scott Eyes! Birds! Walnuts! Pennies! Erin Soros Just Words Erin Soros It is in their Nature to Change: On Mis-leading Elizabeth Reeder Index

Determining the Form

Writing Creative Non-Fiction

Alasdair Gray, author of the modern classics Lanark, Poor Things and 1982, Janine, is without doubt Scotland's greatest living novelist. Since trying (unsuccessfully) to buy him a drink in 1998, Rodge Glass, first tutee and then secretary to the author, takes on the role of biographer, charting Gray's life from unpublished and unrecognised son of a box-maker to septuagenarian "little grey deity" (as Will Self has called him). A Jewish Mancunian Boswell to Gray's Johnson, Glass seamlessly weaves a chronological narrative of his subject's life into his own diary of meeting, getting to know and working with the artist, writer and campaigner, to create a vibrant and wonderfully textured portrait of a literary great.

A Secretary's Biography

Alasdair Gray

A graphic novel about one soldier's return from Afghanistan. Dougie's War is a graphic novel by acclaimed novelist and biographer Rodge Glass and artist Dave Turbitt about the legacy of the war in the Middle East and the effects of Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome on returning veterans. A fictional story, but based on meticulously researched real life experiences of Scottish veterans, Dougie's War shows that the fight doesn't end when men and women leave military service. Dougie Campbell is a Scottish soldier, a veteran of Afghanistan returning home to the south side of Glasgow. He has just left the British Army but cannot forget his experiences of combat. A battle rages inside him as he struggles to adjust to civilian life, trying to live with his memories and understand his need for recognition. As the pressure builds, those closest to Dougie try to intervene to help but fail to anticipate the shocking path he has chosen. Dougie's War is inspired by the classic and highly influential 80s World War 1 comic strip Charley's War, the first to explore the reality of war and what was then called shell shock. Key extracts from Charley's War are included here, together with moving interviews with veterans of conflicts in the Falklands, former Yugoslavia, the first Gulf War, Iraq and Afghanistan

A Graphic Novel about One Soldier's Return from Afghanistan

Dougie's War

Abe Stone is a 61-year-old alcoholic with a Henry VIII fixation going through his third divorce. When he starts receiving letters from his dead mother, Evelyn, he is thrown into a late-stage identity crisis. His fourteen-year old grand-daughter, Lucille, is expelled from school and the unlikely couple embark on a quest to work out what Evelyn is trying to impart and how Abe can begin to put his dishevelled life in order.

No Fireworks

Allan Wilson

Love—if only there was an escape. Set against a backdrop of menial employment, escape into alcohol, and an unflinching belief that life has the potential to offer so much more, this collection explores the tragedy and humor that exists in the everyday lives we lead. Whether they are starting out in life or having a cold moment of realization, Allan Wilson’s poignant vignettes are powerful, unflinching in their honesty, and full of dark humor. We see the real world of love; couples fight, break-up, make-up, and fall in and out of love. Lies, suspicion, and betrayal haunt them. But when they come together in love, can they escape and rise above their problems? Wasted in Love explodes onto the page with vivid, heartbreaking stories and stunning prose. This much-anticipated and praised collection is a brave exploration of the human condition from one of the UK’s most exciting writers.

Wasted in Love

Mark Wilson's whole life has been about the moment when he steps on to Old Trafford to make his first appearance for Man Utd. But when a wayward pass from Ryan Giggs leads to THE WORST DEBUT EVER, Mark's schoolboy obsession with him develops into something more dangerous. Fifteen years later, after a career interrupted by drinking, injury, gambling, RESTRAINING ORDERS and burglary, Mark is now sober, gainfully-employed and looking forward to watching United at their CHAMPIONS LEAGUE-WINNING BEST. Most importantly for Mark, he is reconciled with the mother of his son, little Ryan. But as the old urges continue to struggle for voice in his head, can he keep his eye on the goal?

Rodge Glass

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