Paper Thistle Author Insights

Author Insight: Allan Gaw and the quiet reinvention of Scottish detective fiction

Gaw’s fiction refuses spectacle. It treats crime as interruption rather than entertainment, violence as residue[...]

Author Insight: The evolution of Irvine Welsh’s Scottish urban fiction

Welsh’s Edinburgh is not romantic and it is not redeeming. It is a place where[...]

Author Insight: Why Donald S. Murray’s island writing refuses the tourist version of Scotland

Tourist Scotland wants islands as spiritual décor: mist, charm, timelessness. Donald S. Murray refuses. In[...]

Author Insight: How Sarah Jane Douglas writes survival with mud on its boots

Sarah Jane Douglas refuses the “mountains saved me” wellness shelf. In Just Another Mountain, grief[...]