The Crow Road [Paperback]

When Prentice McHoan, the irrepressible hero of Banks's wily novel whose loves include drink, cars, girls and history, returns from university in Glasgow to his family home in Gallanach for his grandmother's funeral, his thoughts turn to his uncle Rory, a travel writer who disappeared eight years earlier. When Prentice runs into Janice, an old girlfriend of Rory's, the two wonder together if Rory has gone away the Crow Road (Scottish for died), and Janice reveals that Rory gave her a folder of his poems and notes before he disappeared. Rory's writings are tantalizingly cryptic and turn out to include outlines for a novel-in-progress titled Crow Road. Fueled by his uncle's notes, his own curiosity and a good bit of brown liquor, Prentice sets off to find his uncle in an engaging narrative that admirably balances bawdy Scottish humor, crafty character development and some good old-fashioned mystery. Prentice finds his closure—for better or for worse—and things are tied up neatly (maybe too neatly) by the end. Readers unfamiliar with Banks's prodigious output have a great starting point here. (Aug.)
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Banks has woven a warm and funny story, rich with characters and adventures. An utterly enchanting piece of fiction...it marks a return to his brilliant best. NEW WOMAN This is Bank s' finest novel yet. INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY Hip and sexy humour...Bank reinforces his credentials as one of the most able, energetic and stimulating writers we have in the UK. TIME OUT The Crow Road is tight with detail and closer observation and creates a strong sense of a particular period of growing up. THE INDEPENDENT Magic is the book's keynote. It echoes in descriptions of evolution that pass from the factual to the elegiac and on the mythical. It calls most insistently when intensity - of love, lust or grief - burst through limited expectations or circumstances to release poetry. THE TIMES Banks keeps death in its place, under the boot of wit which knows that the most significant romance can blossom whilst your youngest brother is up to the elbow in Sugar Smacks looking for the plastic toy. OBSERVER The tense horror of the book...is done with considerable imaginative subtlety and a fine touch...This is as fine and ambitious a novel as any from a Scottish writer since the 1960s. It is also unquestionable Bank's best work to date. NEW STATESMAN A magnificent, rambling family saga...his best novel yet. FOR HIM

From its bravura opening onwards, THE CROW ROAD is justly regarded as an outstanding contemporary novel. 'It was the day my grandmother exploded. I sat in the crematorium, listening to my Uncle Hamish quietly snoring in harmony to Bach's Mass in B Minor, and I reflected that it always seemed to be death that drew me back to Gallanach.' Prentice McHoan has returned to the bosom of his complex but enduring Scottish family. Full of questions about the McHoan past, present and future, he is also deeply preoccupied: mainly with death, sex, drink, God and illegal substances...

Iain Banks came to widespread and controversial public notice with the publication of his first novel, THE WASP FACTORY, in 1984. He has since gained enormous popular and critical acclaim for both his mainstream and his science fiction novels.