How Late It Was How Late

WINNER OF THE BOOKER PRIZE‘A passionate, scintillating, brilliant song of a book’GuardianSammy's had a bad week.Most of it's just a blank space in his mind, and the bits that he can remember, he'd rather not. His wallet's gone, along with his new shoes, he's been arrested then beaten up by the police and thrown out on the street - and he's just gone blind. He remembers a row with his girlfriend, but she seems to have disappeared; and he might have been trying to fix a bit of business up with an old mate, he's not too sure.Things aren't looking too good for Sammy and his problems have hardly begun.

A passionate, scintillating, brilliant song of a book, Forging a wholly distinctive style from the bruised cadences of demotic Glaswegian, Kelman renders the hidden depths of ordinary lives in sardonic, abrasive prose which is more revealing of feelings that could ever be expected...as uplifting a novel as one could ever hope to read, A work of marvellous vibrance and richness of character… it convinces, it charms, it entertains, it informs and it has life…. How Late it Was, How Late deserves every accolade it gets

James Kelman was born in Glasgow in 1946. His books include Not not while the giro, The Busconducter Hines, A Chancer, Greyhound for Breakfast, which won the 1987 Cheltenham Prize, and A Disaffection, which won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize and was shortlisted for the Booker Prize, and How late it was, how late, which won the 1994 Booker Prize.