This is a very depressing read but so gritty and true to life
The characters are well developed and the writing is fantastic
Despite the gritty nature, it is an uplifting book

A dark, depressing, gritty read!
It's also incredibly compelling.
Worth all the hype & the booker, Stuart is definitely an author to watch

Shuggie Bain is the portrayal of a working class family struggling through the poverty stricken Glasgow of 1980s. Although I, as a young teenager in Glasgow in the 1980s, don't recognise this particular vision of Glasgow. In my mind I would have thought it was set a decade or so earlier without the time stamps throughout.

For me, this story is not so much this portrayal as it is the story of a family suffering through life with an addict, Agnes Bain's drug of choice being alcohol.

Agnes, keen to keep the neighbours from knowing her business, projects a false image and the family are branded as snobs, thus creating a wider divide between them and possible allies for her three children. The difficulties in their lives not then being restricted to living with an alcoholic parent.

I have absolutely no doubt that people living and loving addicts, either past or present, will recognise parts of this story with sadness and perhaps relief....that they managed to dodge this particular life.

A poignant tale of a family's struggle to survive the life dealt to them in whatever way deemed necessary at the time.

After hearing about Shuggie Bain from friends and the media, I have to admit I put it off for quite a while, as I wasn’t sure I was in the right headspace for it. When I finally picked it up, I really enjoyed it, but as I expected also found it very difficult to read at times. While Douglas Stuart fills it with humour and touching moments, poor Snuggie’s story is unrelentingly grim and shocking. It is an amazing portrayal of poverty, addiction, and how children can be let down by the system and indeed all the adults who are meant to care for them. Powerful and certainly packs a punch.
Thanks to NetGalley and Pan Macmillan for this arc in exchange for an honest review.

This book should come with a warning as it does contain passages that may be very upsetting to others due to the sexual nature of them. I would say that this is not the book to read if you are easily offended.

My thanks to the Publishers via NetGalley for a copy of this book. This book made it on to the Booker Prize shortlist in 2020 and was voted the winner. It has won other book awards too and was voted Debut Novel of the Year and Book of the Year for 2021 by the British Book Awards. I am not always drawn to books that are award winners as they can often be quite pretentious in nature, this was nothing like that at all in my opinion.

Set in Glasgow in the early 1980's, at a time when times were hard for many (not that times aren't hard now or haven't been at other times), this is a gritty story about Hugh Bain known to all as 'Shuggie' and the people that he knows. Shuggie tries his hardest to fit in, but it's not the easiest of tasks for him. He is a troubled child, that suffers at the hands of abusers and bullies. His mother is an alcoholic with dubious morals, trying to make a living for her and her family. This is quite a dark read that portrays the darker side of our society. The story draws you in and you feel for Shuggie and his siblings (they seem to take a minor part in the story), he won't be the only child that's been brought up in similar circumstances and he certainly won't be the last sadly.

I quite enjoyed this story and found it a well written debut novel that took me back to my teens and the way things were for many back then. The Tories were in power and Margaret Thatcher was Prime Minister, she ruled the Country with a determination not seen in some Politicians before. Many didn't approve of what the Tories were doing and their popularity in the polls and with the public took a huge dip. It was the era of striking in many different areas and power cuts were the norm. Unemployment was high and trying to make ends meet wasn't easy at all. Times were hard for many of us (speaking from some experience) and money wasn't in great supply.

It's not often that you see your name appear in books, when it's not a very common one. I was quite pleased to see my name appear in this one. Shuggie's Mum has a 'friend' called Mr McNamara, in one passage in the book he is making her a picnic and has snuck the food into his house.

'He would tell her some other time how that morning he had made the thick sandwiches on a cutting board that he had taken into the locked bathroom. He would tell her about his daughter Bernie and her prying ways, but later, much later. It could all wait, he didn't want to spoil the lovely day.'

This debut novel would make a great reading group read. There is so much that can be discussed. Why not grab a copy and see what you think of it for yourself.

Shuggie Bain is a remarkable story written by Douglas Stuart chronicling the life of a young boy in Glasgow from the early eighties to the early nineties. At times humorous and at times heartbreaking, the author has created no ordinary boy. Shuggie’s parents are at best neglectful of their three children and yet Shuggie demonstrates a lasting and deep love for his alcoholic mother Agnes.

As the story unfolds, Shuggie is increasingly left to bear the responsibility for Agnes, completely reversing the parent/child relationship. Some of the episodes of Agnes’ loss of control over her everyday life were unbearable to read and I couldn’t help but feel anger towards her, despite her illness.

It’s a thoroughly well written book which will stay with me. I wholeheartedly recommend it.

This was quite a hard book for me to review the first half I didn’t connect with at all and was a difficult read. The second half of the book I grew to love Shuggie. He had a hard upbringing and some of the topics are hard hitting but I think important to know about even if you do not relate to them yourself. This was going to be 3 stars for me but because I enjoyed the second half and then grew to love Shuggie I boosted it to 4 stars for that reason.

Warning: Do NOT read this in a low mood! It’s as bleak as only Glasgow can be, it’s desperate, it’s an inescapable landscape of doom, spanning grey generations merely existing in grey tenements without real hope of improving their lot.
I liked the title - no frills, just the protagonist’s name like a monument to him. Shuggie grows up in the scrag end of Glasgow suburbs in the Thatcher era 1980s of pit closures and real poverty. He is a sensitive boy, targetted by the feral children of the dilapidated housing scheme he lives in with his Mum Agnes and his brother Leek. Agnes is a beautiful woman, always turned out well and, outwardly, “having standards”. But her steady descent into alcoholic dependence and dependence on men are dragging her family towards the abyss. Shuggie’s devotion to his alcoholic mother is unstinting, coping with her flotsam of alcy acquaintances and a steady flow of “uncles” threatens any chance that Shuggie has to escape this childhood hellhole. But Shuggie is made of sterner stuff: He is clever and he grasps mere moments of his Mum’s phases of sobriety with both hands.
Reading this book, you will scream at Agnes, you will cry with Shuggie and rage at the injustices he will endure, but most of all you will cheer Shuggie along and will him to succeed against the odds.
The portrayal of growing up in such circumstances is so vivid that it can only come from close observation or indeed immersion. Douglas Stuart did grow up in Sighthill with an alcoholic mother; that’s where the story’s red-raw authenticity comes from.
A shockingly powerful, gut-wrenching story with rare glimpses of optimism.

I'm about a third of the way through this prize-winning book but I don't think I can finish it. Such a terribly sad and bleak story it's taking me to a very dark place that is not helping my mental health at all. It's a well-written novel, some of it beautiful, but I think I'll come back to it in happier times. It's based on the writer's own life, so to overcome such a harrowing start and create a successful novel is an amazing feat of endurance and love. All the very best to Douglas Stuart.

Shuggie Bain left me reeling. Watching the hopeless journey of one character through the eyes of a child destroyed me.

This was such a difficult read, for many reasons.
Firstly, maybe reading this book was not the best choice for me, in the middle of a pandemic, nearly a year after losing my sister. The subject matter was incredibly dark, gritty, harrowing and totally unflinching.
That said, it took a while to get into, and used to the dialect and the style of writing, and coupled with the subject matter, I would dread reading it and was not enjoying it.
I plan to revisit the book at a happier time, as I know it is more powerful because of those factors.

Sometimes where there is a lot of hype surrounding a book, it puts me off reading because I think it will never live up to the expectations I've set for it. Despite the huge hype surrounding this book I decided to give it a chance, being from a working class area from Glasgow myself I felt it might resonate in a way. I am so glad I gave this book a chance. It has a firm spot in my favourite books of all time list.

The book follows Shuggie & Agnes Bain through Thatchers Scotland. A mother struggling with addiction and young boy trying to grapple his sexuality in working class Glasgow in the 1980s. I have never read a book that manages to capture the experience of loving an addict so beautifully. It includes the raw and unflinching tenderness as well as the hard to stomach pain that addiction brings.

This book is absolutely beautiful. Please believe the hype and read it.

What can I add to the heaps of praise this book has already had? It's a triumph. Full of joy, despite the sadness, and light despite the cruelty.

Are there even adequate words in this language or any other to describe how this book made me feel? Probably not, but I can try.

Shuggie Bain made me feel everything at once. Fear, anger, frustration, compassion, hate... We get a glimpse into Shuggie's life, with his alcoholic mother and siblings, and what they go through in the span of approximately 8 years. It's a story about sad, dark lives, stories that aren't unrealistic and that probably are happening somewhere while I am reading this book.

The reality of this is what makes it so painful to read. I found myself wanting to cry for Shuggie, to hug him, to talk to him, to tell him that everything will be alright, that's he's normal, that nothing is his fault. Then, I found myself hating Agnes, hating what she did, how the children suffered because of her. I constantly kept thinking about how their lives could have been different if it weren't for the terrible addiction Agnes battled with. But, she, along with all of the other characters in this story isn't just flat and one-sided. She is complex, as all of us are. I also felt said for Agnes, I wanted to help her, I felt for her, I felt the deep darkness she drifted off too, and the helplessness she felt. The desperation the disappointment in life that she couldn't shake away.

The writing is beautiful, and the pacing is just right. Once swept up, it was difficult to put the book down, although I had to do it, because It deeply affected me.

The book covers a lot of themes from abuse, rape, addiction, family relationships.

It really made me think a lot about families and what breaks families apart. How seemingly insignificant moments and events, all pile up on top of each other, until you wake up one day and you're lying in the ruins of what you created, but you don't know how you got there. But mostly, I felt sorry for all the children in this world who are born good, naive, a blank slate and are immediately deprived of the beauty of life due to the family they are born into.

I can understand why this book has won the first prize. And I am happy to have had a chance to get to know Shuggie.

Who would like it: If you enjoy books like A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara, or Freedom by Jonathan Franzen, you'll probably like this book as well.

Agnes Bain loves her kids. The problem is, she loves the booze more than anything. Her youngest, Shuggie (Hugh) is a sensitive lad, old before his time, persecuted by other kids for his 'posh' diction, his careful dress and for not being as manly as they think he should be. Shuggie tries his hardest to look after Agnes, but the booze is stronger and she's deeply self-destructive. The book plays out over ten or eleven years as the family falls apart, dad Big Shug leaves them to fend for themselves in a crumbling estate in a coal mining village and Agnes tries (not hard enough) to maintain her sense of superiority over her neighbours whilst robbing the gas meter and resorting to whatever it takes to keep the alcohol flowing.

I love it when the Booker Prize judges choose a book like this. It's a fantastic read and it will baffle the heck out of all those readers who are unfamiliar with Scottish accents and vernacular. In that respect, it reminds me of when Milkman won the Booker and readers around the world couldn't figure it out at all. It's 'literary' without being po-faced or self-congratulatory. It's a book I wanted to savour and take my time with.

The publicity I'd heard about the book told me it would be relentlessly miserable, and it is. Think 'Angela's Ashes' if Angela's jam jar was filled with vodka instead of tea and she was too proud to ask for help. Agnes is a character who is hard to love but easy to pity but perhaps we should save that pity for her children, especially poor wee Shuggie. The book is set at a time that those who lived through it will remember as particularly miserable - Thatcher's conflict with the miners, the battle against Clause 28 (I mention that because the ignorance about 'poofters' shown by Shuggie's schoolmates and neighbours was typical of the time), Glaswegian Catholic-Protestant sectarianism, renting your television and putting money in the gas and TV meters, terrible decaying public housing stock and much more.

If you're the type who avoids Booker Prize winners on the assumption that they'll be incomprehensible or overly worthy, will sacrifice substance for style, then fear not; this is a deeply readable book about characters you can't help but care for, and a desperately sad account of the evils of alcohol when it becomes the only thing that matters in a person's life.

Shuggie Bain is a beautifully written, poignant account of a Glaswegian family and their struggles through poverty, family breakdown, alcoholism, and community divisiveness. In a society where misery and despair circle like vultures, after years of economic assault from a Thatcher government on working-class people, the Bain family’s own story is one of profound hardship and an attempt to escape their embattled lives.

Shuggie Bain is a young boy, effeminate in nature, speaking and acting in a manner that regularly brings him into conflict with the other neighbourhood boys. He wants to be ‘normal’ and challenges himself to act normal, to be more like the others, but his nature and his love for his mother are things he can’t escape. While the book title may recognise Shuggie Bain as the main character, his mother Agnes is just as much an absorbing and predominant personality. Agnes is a damaged person, and in my opinion, is the real star of the story. Agnes has two children to a previous husband, Catherine and Leek. Shuggie is the son to her latest husband Shug Bain who is cruel, selfish, abusive, and spends his time chasing other women. Agnes holds onto the notion that she can dress and speak in a way that elevates her from those neighbours in the tenements and mining streets, but her alcohol addiction drags that image down.

“How she could no longer pretend that she was nothing like them, that she was better born and stuck only temporarily in their forgotten corner of misery. It was pride, not danger, that made her so angry.”

The scenes Agnes faces illustrate how hardship and humour are two sides of the same coin. With a dreary life and peculiar characters, humour is always present and ready to light the darkest moments.

Agnes, Shug, Catherine, Leek, and Shuggie all dream of escape from this life and one by one they manage to achieve some level of a new life – all except Agnes and Shuggie, who are thwarted by the millstone alcohol has on Agnes. All the characters offer a unique blend of traits that illustrate an exceptional complexity in human personalities and relationships. The dark humour which renowned in Glasgow is evident and is characteristically deployed at the most inopportune moments. The brilliant Scottish comedian Billy Connolly grew up in the tenements of Glasgow, working in the shipyards under tough conditions, with a sense of humour, a community where families lived on top of each other and shared a duty to support each other in daily needs. Douglas Stuart creates characters in Agnes and Shuggie who challenges that camaraderie, thinking they should be living loftier lifestyles, Agnes because she couldn’t accept how her life panned out, and Shuggie because he was devoted to his mother complied regardless. Douglas Stuart is from Glasgow and much of the background associated with Shuggie is drawn from personal experience and a reference to his own mother states that “My mother died very quietly of addiction one day.”

I would highly recommend this book especially for readers who enjoy deep character studies, a challenging background and human character observation insights that are off the charts. All brought to life with wonderful writing that has been widely recognised as it is the winner of the Booker Prize for 2020.

I would like to thank Pan Macmillan, Picador and NetGalley for providing me with a free ARC in return for an honest review.

Shuggie is a young boy growing up in poverty-stricken 1980s Glasgow, with a single, alcoholic mother called Agnes. The story really is about her journey trying to raise a young child and live the life she's always dreamed of while battling her addictions with next to no money and no support. Shuggie himself feels like a burden but has a fierce, determined and unconditional love for his mother, and that's what really shines through while reading this challenging and powerful novel.

It took me around two months to read Shuggie Bain, dipping in and out of it while reading other things on the side. Usually I lose interest doing this, but with Shuggie the writing is so powerful and so emotive that it stuck with me even if I went a week or so without reading. It meant I really savoured the words and took my time, rather than rushing through, and this really increased the impact the book had on me. It's not a book to be rushed; it's tender, challenging, and it both demands and deserves your time.

Generally, it is difficult to read. Some scenes are brutal - both in actions as well as in the unflinching honesty and vulnerability displayed by the characters. The writing really is so immersive and stunning - how Douglas Stuart manages to so effectively recreate the feelings of the characters within the reader really is impressive. Your heart absolutely swells for the trials of both Agnes and Shuggie, and the undying bond between mother and son, despite the times when Agnes can barely even look at Shuggie and makes terrible decisions spurred on by addiction, is so touching and moving. He's also battling with bullying and trying to fit in with his peers - he's queer - and with everything going on you just want to scoop him up and give him the biggest hug.

It doesn't end happily, but then, I don't think that should come as a surprise. It's raw, emotional, and above all else, it feels real. I was really surprised by this novel, and I've come to love it even though it is gutwrenching at times. It's grittier than my usual choice of read, but I'm glad I gave it a chance. I think it really is a worthy winner of the Booker prize, and I cannot recommend it enough.

Following the announcement of it winning the 2020 Booker Prize I was grateful to Pan Macmillan/Picador for offering a digital edition, via NetGalley, of ‘Shuggie Bain’ by Douglas Stuart to read and review.

Set in Glasgow from 1981, it follows the story of Shuggie Bain from the age of five through to sixteen. As he grows up it is clear that he is different to the other children - rather fastidious and fussy, which makes him the target of bullying. The adults also consider him as odd, no’ right.

His mother, Agnes Bain, is a great beauty, though after her husband, Big Shug, leaves her and their three children for another woman, she begins to descend deeper and deeper into drink. The children try their best to save her, yet are forced to abandon her to save themselves. Shuggie continues to hold out hope that he can not only help his mother but make himself normal.

Well, as might be imagined this novel set during the Thatcher-era is not exactly a barrel of laughs though there are moments of levity that throw into contrast the desperation experienced by its characters.

I found it a very raw and hard hitting novel. I had expected it to be more about Shuggie’s journey though its main focus was on Agnes and the relationship between mother and son. Her battle with alcoholism was very difficult to read. I was especially shocked that she let her children go hungry spending money allocated for food on drink for herself.

While Stuart says it is not autobiographical, he does admit that it was inspired by his upbringing. In an interview with The Herald Scotland he details the distance between himself and his creation:“Shuggie is definitely a work of fiction, Teddy, so I think it’s very far apart, although I am the queer son of a single mother who lost her battle to addiction.”

I do wonder about the ‘very far apart’ - as with other novels, including the 2020 International Booker Prize winner, ‘The Discomfort of Evening’, while strictly not a memoir ‘Shuggie Bain’ still appears to be another literary novel that is essentially a fictionalised misery memoir.

Douglas Stuart utilities the Glasgow dialect throughout the novel and I was concerned that this would prove a barrier, especially given its length. I circumvented this by listening to its unabridged audiobook edition, narrated by Angus King, alongside reading the text.

It certainly was a powerful novel, that vividly captured an aspect of working class life during this period in recent British history.

Overall, despite it not being really to my taste, I am glad that I read it. 3.5 stars rounded up to 4.

Gloriously miserable! It is a talented thing to be able to write a book without a climactic event well, and this is it.

The book follows the life of Shuggie Bain, the last child of Agnes Bain, as he grows from a baby to a young adult. It looks at the minutiae of life growing up in Glasgow with an alcoholic mother.

From reviews I had read I was expecting the book to focus more on Shuggie’s sexuality, however this was a minor part of the book for me. It was far more about Agnes’ struggle with alcohol, the reality of life in working class Glasgow in the ‘80s/90s, and Shuggie’s choices.

The book is powerful and eye-opening. Highly recommended.

DISCLAIMER : Thank you, Netgalley, Pan Macmillan and Picador books for providing me with an ARC of this book. I am leaving this review voluntarily.

DISCLAIMER : Substance addiction, alcoholism, substance abuse, physical abuse, Child abuse, child sexual abuse, rape, sexual abuse, molestation, and explicit language

Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stewart is the winner of the 2020 Booker Prize. To know that this book was rejected 32 times before it got published is baffling to me. Reading that was such a shock and the irony of it is just great. The book is a winner for the Booker Prize, and it's almost like the universe telling the publishers where to take their rejections. I haven't read the other books on the list, and I do have to say after reading this book, I am not surprised that this book got the recognition it did. Every time I see a book that is a popular book, on Netgalley, especially one that is already published, I know that there is no chance I could get to review it. But despite my doubts, I still requested it, and I am happy to say I was excited when I saw this on my shelf.

The story is of Shuggie Bain, a young boy who becomes the sole caretaker of his alcoholic mother after his dad and siblings leave him. Agnes Bain is all about appearance. After leaving her Catholic husband for an exciting adventure with a philandering taxi driver, and she is faced with the realization that the life she dreamed of will never come to fruition. She is depressed and takes to drinking to drown her sorrows. Agnes and her three kids move to a public housing unit, feeling hopeful for a better future. Life had other plans for Agnes, who will be abandoned, again by her husband. He punishes her for not giving up on her drinking and only visits her to give her more abuse. In all of this, Shuggie is the only one who unconditionally loves his mom and his belief that he will be enough for her to stop the drinking. All along Shuggie is trying hard to be like other boys and struggling with fitting in. He is bullied and abused by his school mates, and the need to be normal holds him back from being free. The novel is an intimate and raw portrayal of the ugliness that resides in the hearts of humanity. The strengths, the weaknesses of the individual characters, and the love that encapsulates all of them bring forward an unforgettable story of a young boy with a heart of gold and naivety that will ultimately threaten to destroy him.

Overall, the imagery, the language, the desperation, and the desolation that is at the center of this novel leaves me speechless. The vivid descriptions of Glasgow in the 80s will be staying in my memory forever bringing to life the glamorous and the ever self-destructive Agnes Taylor and her meticulously dressed, posh-speaking Shuggie Bain, who was a breath of fresh air with his innocence. I gave this book 4.5 stars, and highly recommend reading this extremely devastating and raw portrayal of life at its lowest and the hope rising from the ashes.