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 PORNO
by Irvine Welsh. Fiction, 2002. 484 Pages.
Jonathan Cape/Random House Publishing-
“It’s a load ay fuckin shite n it’s gittin oan ma tits so
shut the fuck up or yi’ll git yir fuckin mooths burst.”- Renton
quoting Sick Boy quoting Begbie.
The other night I was drunkenly rambling on about the
fact that I think the only celebrity I’d be even remotely excited to
meet would be Mr. Irvine Fucking Welsh.
Even sober, as I sort of am now, I think that’s still a true
statement. And while I
haven’t actually had the privilege of meeting ol’ Irvine, I did get to
hear him read a few excerpts from this book at a reading in Brookline (MA)
yesterday. It was cool as hell. Life
is good sometimes.
Porno is
primarily about where the main characters from Trainspotting
are ten years later, and I absolutely love it.
As an added bonus, you also catch up with some of the characters
from Welsh’s other books, including the inimitable “Juice” Terry
Lawson from Glue. Each chapter is
told from a different person’s point of view, and they all weave
together wonderfully. You get
to hear the very distinctive voices of Trainspotting’s
Simon “Sick Boy” Williamson (even more self-centered and evil than
ever), Frank Begbie (my favorite character in this fucker- he’s both
hilarious and scary, and he’s way over-the-top and completely out of
control after getting out of jail for a manslaughter conviction that
should have been a murder rap), Danny “Spud” Murphy (still the same
loveable, incredibly nice, drug-addled fuck-up but with a wife and kid
this go-round), Mark Renton (older, wiser, more physically fit yet still
just as likeable) and a new character, Nikki Fuller Smith (gorgeous,
self-centered British student studying in Scotland who becomes a porn
actress in her desire to live life to the fullest).
There’s all kindsa stuff happening here, but
the story basically centers on Sick Boy’s return home to Scotland and
his go at being a publican and a porn director/producer.
He has a ton of duplicitous shit going on, but his main focus-
aside from his self-promoting porn vehicle and his increasingly voracious
appetite for cocaine- is his attempt to find and then pay Renton back for
the rip-off he pulled in Trainspotting.
With Begbie’s release from prison, the stakes only get higher,
and it’s really fun reading along as things roar to a head.
And oh, yeah- as the book’s title so subtly implies, there’s
also a helluva lot of hardcore sex going on throughout.
For those who haven’t read any of Welsh’s
earlier books, the Scottish vernacular may be a bit hard to understand at
first (especially Spud and Begbie’s chapters), but eventually you’ll
get it. And for those who are
self-conscious, you may want to read this book in private.
It has a big red cover with the word PORNO emblazoned at the top,
along with a shot of a blow-up doll below it, and it’ll show your
co-workers that you’re really the sexual pre-vert that they think you
are as you devour it during your all-too-short lunch break.
Nevertheless, you should read Porno
because it’s the best motherfuckin’ book that’s come out so far
in 2002. –Ben Hunter
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