The Cutting Room

Set in contemporary Glasgow, The Cutting Room is narrated by Rilke, one of the most engaging, flawed and hedonistic fictional creation of recent years. When this dissolute and promiscuous auctioneer comes upon a hidden collection of violent, and highly disturbing, erotic photographs, he feels compelled to unearth more about the deceased owner who coveted them. What follows is a compulsive journey of discovery, decadence and deviousness.

ISBN 1841954047   DEWEY edition DC21 ISBN13 9781841954042 (What's this?)   Pages 294 Publisher Canongate Books Ltd   Weight (grammes) 246 Imprint Canongate Books Ltd   Published in Edinburgh Format Paperback   Previous ISBN 9781841952802 Publication date 01 May 2003   Height (mm) 198 Library of Congress PR6073   Width (mm) 130 DEWEY 823.92   Academic level General

1		Never Expect Anything		1
2		Say Cheese		15
3		A Walk in the Park		25
4		The Final Frame		34
5		Leslie		50
6		The Nature of Pornography		62
7		Camera Club		83
8		TV Land		95
9		Caveat Emptor		119
10		Gilmartin's		132
11		The Worm on the Bud		148
12		Making Up is Hard to Do		156
13		Steenie		167
14		The Imp of the Perverse		184
15		Abandon Hope		189
16		In the Shadow of the Necropolis		196
17		Inside the Frame		208
18		Trophies		222
19		Downhill from Here		242
20		Sale of the Century		255
21		The Reckoning		265
22		The Final Cut		271
23		Transcript		277
		Epilogue: Soleil et Desole		284

THE DARK SIDE of Glasgow lies behind this black, erotic thriller. Homosexual antique dealer Rilke is commissioned to sell at auction the entire contents of a deceased old man's estate. What seems a straightforward deal turns suspicious upon the discovery of a hidden collection of erotica, secreted away in a loft. The chance unearthing of a packet of disturbing photographs sets Rilke on a trail through Glasgow's pornography industry in search of answers. Transvestites, rent boys, sadists and the generally sexually perverted all make an appearance, the possibility of snuff activities dangling over the story till the finale. Deceit, double-dealing and degradation fill the pages with the self-effacing, downward spiralling Rilke at the centre, trying to cling to reality and his sanity through a drunken haze induced by the horrors he has found. Homoerotic, this is not a book for the sexually squeamish. Newcomer Louise Welsh writes with unusual candour, succinctly capturing the various sexual persuasions and preferences mankind has always chased. Her easy style ensnares the reader, drawing them down to the dregs of depravity at the same time as tantalisingly teasing the plot along till its climactic ending. - Lucy Watson

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