Young Mungo: The No. 1 Sunday Times Bestseller

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Nicola Sturgeon, former First Minister of Scotland Few novels are as gutsy and gut-wrenching as Young Mungo in its depiction of a teenage boy who finds love amid family dysfunction, community conflict and the truly terrible predations of adults. Vividly realised and emotionally intense, this scorching novel is an urgent addition to the new canon of unsung stories. It is set in the Glasgow of the early 1990s and SEEMS to capture the gloomy part of the city aptly. Born in Glasgow, Scotland, after receiving his MA from the Royal College of Art in London, he has lived and worked in New York City. The novel opens with Mungo Hamilton, a 15-year-old Scottish teenager, preparing for a trip with two men who his mother met at an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting, St. Christopher and Gallowgate, who plan to take him fishing to learn how to be a man. Months earlier, Mungo was living at home being cared for by his sister Jodie, with the constant threat of being taken away by social services in the absence of his mother, Maureen. One day, he sees James, a Catholic boy who lives across the street from him and who built a dovecote to raise poultry, through his window. The two become friends and soon develop a romance, which becomes their first relationship that does not involve constant acts of violence. Both this and Shuggie could very well stand having sequels written, and it's a sign of a great book that the author leaves you wanting MORE of his characters, and eager to find out the next chapters in their lives - they are that real to the reader. If the quality of Stuart's writing continues to be of this high caliber, he going to have to make room for more awards on his trophy shelf - I would be amazed if this doesn't garner at LEAST another Booker nomination, and perhaps even take the crown again in 2022. I also predict it will be a smashing critical and popular success when it is published in late April

What I thought was interesting was to discuss where the book is both similar to and different from “Shuggie Bain”.The book doesn’t feel like effortless writing. It tries too hard to justify the tag of 'literary fiction' and is just as verbose as the blurb indicates. Some analogies work. Most are superfluous and/or superficial. Flowery prose appeals to me only if it is accompanied by a strong plot. When there are miles and miles of prose and barely any signs of a plot, I lose my interest. Norwegian: Unge Mungo. Translated by Hilde Stubhaug. Oslo: Gyldendal Norsk Forlag. 19 May 2022. ISBN 9788205563469. Kelly, Hillary (31 March 2022). "Review: How Douglas Stuart subverts the Victorian coming-of-age plot". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on 31 March 2022 . Retrieved 24 February 2023.

Shuggie Bain, Stuart's Booker winning (and SHOULD have been NBA winning. over the definitely inferior Interior Chinatown) debut novel, was my favorite book of 2020, and unless I read something truly astonishing in the next 5 days, his second book is destined to appropriately be my favorite book of this rather bleak year. A warm thank you to Netgalley, the author and Grove Atlantic for an e-copy. This was released April 2022 and I am providing my honest review.

It is obvious to everyone that Mungo is different. His mother and sister convince themselves he is a “late bloomer”, a fatherless boy who needs a firm hand from someone who knows how to “make a man out of you”. Mo-Maw’s way of doing this is to send Mungo off on a fishing trip into the wilderness with two obviously dodgy men she barely knows from AA meetings. “Dinnae go far, Mungo,” says one of the bad ’uns, who calls himself “Gallowgate”. “Bad things happen to wee boys in dark forests.” The blatant foreshadowing is one of ­Stuart’s few authorial missteps. He has told us enough for us to know that the question isn’t whether the trip will go wrong, but how badly. year old Mungo is the youngest of three siblings. With an absent dad and an uncaring alcoholic mom, Mungo grows up primarily bonding with his 17 year old sister Jodie, who is forced to take care of the home along with her studies. Their elder brother Hamish is a gang leader and head of a Protestant group that engages in violent fights against a neighbouring Catholic gang.