One Drink Book Club | Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stuart

[00:00:09] Hello and welcome to another edition of the One Drink Book Club. Today we're going to be discussing the novel Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stuart. Shuggie Bain tells the story of a young boy growing up in Glasgow in the 1980s who struggles with taking care of an increasingly hopeless alcoholic mother. Joining me tonight is my friend John Scheffler who seems to consistently turn me on to great books that also feature hard to understand accents. Welcome John. Thanks.

[00:00:36] Hi Jamie. Thanks for having me. This is really nice of you to have somebody like me on your podcast.

[00:00:42] Well you always, you are clearly a big reader and you always turn me on to some good books. And I love this book. I thought it was a great recommendation. It's beautifully written, even if it's pretty hard to read at times.

[00:00:58] Thanks.

[00:00:59] And as we kick this off, I feel like the drink portion of this podcast becomes a little bit awkward since alcoholism features so prominently in this book. But that being said, what did you make tonight?

[00:01:12] So I, in honor of Agnes Bain, I am in her one year of sobriety that she accomplished once in her life. I'm having a tonic water with a little lab juice in it.

[00:01:24] So honoring her tonight.

[00:01:25] So we clearly went down the same road. I made what is called a long vodka, which is a popular drink in Scotland, but I made the long vodka with non-alcoholic vodka, which I've never tried before, but I went out and bought some.

[00:01:49] It's a zero, you know, zero proof spirit and it's got whatever this is plus a lemonade, a lime cordial, and a little bit of soda water.

[00:02:04] So that, that makes zero sense to me.

[00:02:07] Potato, fermented potato without the alcohol is worse than decaffeinated coffee.

[00:02:14] It's pointless.

[00:02:16] Well, I mean, how it goes for you.

[00:02:18] Yeah. You know, it tastes fine. It tastes kind of like a Sprite.

[00:02:23] But I just felt, you know, like you, it seemed, it seemed a little bit weird to celebrate this book with a drink.

[00:02:33] Well, I remember you and I were kicking around titles to talk about on the podcast and, and I threw a bunch at you and you kind of came back at me and said, you know, is it really appropriate for two middle-aged white guys to be commenting on some of the books that we're reading?

[00:02:46] Um, and, and so we ended up picking a book about a poor urban Scottish gay kid riddled by his mother's alcoholism.

[00:02:55] So I'm not sure any more qualified than we were before, but, uh, it was a good one. You're right. It was a tough one to read. Um, and I don't like to read them all the time, but every now and then, you know, one in every 10 books has got to be something that, um, that makes you think.

[00:03:08] And also makes you grateful for some of the things that you got and how life is tough for a lot of folks out there. And the other thing I liked about it too was, was this guy's about our age, maybe a little bit younger.

[00:03:18] Um, I also liked the fact that, um, you know, you sit around, you think maybe someday I'll write a book and I have never gotten beyond just thinking it. I haven't even picked up a piece of paper and tried, but, but this is this guy's first book, his first novel.

[00:03:32] Um, Douglas Stewart, um, you know, came from the fashion industry, I think. And, and, um, in between work shifts would, would scribble a note here and there. And he, and he cuddled it together and wove together this great tale. Um, I think much of it memoir based. Um, although he does not say that it's a memoir. Um, there are three siblings. There's a mother who's an alcoholic in his real life. And, and, um, and, uh, and, and, and so I, I think it does fall more as a, as a memoir for him.

[00:04:02] But yeah, powerful stuff at a time that we can all remember too. So I think it, it, um, it, it holds something for us.

[00:04:09] You know, I, I thought it was interesting. Um, I had not researched the author before, uh, I read the book and, and only looked then after, but in reading it, uh, you, you kind of felt like there is no way you could write this particular book without drawing on personal experience.

[00:04:30] Um, because some of the, the scenes that he paints, um, with Agnes's, the Shuny Bane's mother, uh, are so vivid and so, um, exact, uh, that it, it, it, it, it can't come completely from imagination.

[00:04:49] I imagine. You know, I think you're right. And, and what sort of struck me when I was sort of thinking about what we're going to talk about tonight. And, and I had to ask myself, what kind of a book is it?

[00:04:59] You know, is it, um, is it, um, is it the modern day Dickensian novel on economic injustice? Is it, um, a critique on 1980s Margaret Thatcher economics? Is it, um, is it an LGBT book? Um, is it a memoir? Um, and I think the, the answer is it's all these things, right?

[00:05:23] I mean, it's, it's a little bit of all of that. And so I think to your point, to be able to kind of layer those different themes on top of each other, you got to have a, one heck of a centered point of view and, and, and some real context for what, what you're writing about.

[00:05:37] And he, I think he really lived it. And it's a, it's a tough tale. I mean, it's tough time to be a adolescent growing up in, in Glasgow, uh, in the late eighties and nineties. And, and, um, and there's a component of being bullied. And the one thing that jumped out at me, you know, you read about some of these English based books. Um, I read Keith Richards biography or autobiography and life like in from age 12 to 17.

[00:06:07] If you're a boy growing up in the UK and especially in those lower income areas, I mean, getting through the day is, is a struggle. I mean, you walk to school and it's, it's a Lord of the flies kind of way of life. And you go through that. And Keith Richards tells about, you just had to show up every day and you had to learn how to fight. Um, and this poor kid, Shiggy Bane, um, you know, struggling with who he is and not knowing who he is and being on the effeminate side and being teased for it. And, um, um, being small, uh, was an easy target.

[00:06:36] And, you know, that's sort of the first place where your heart breaks for the kid is he just gets bullied all the time for just being a shy little kid. And then you throw the exhausting drumbeat of his mother's alcoholism. And as it gets worse and worse and worse, he has to do more and do more to sort of cover for it and to care for her and enable her and stay loyal to her. Um, by the end of the book, you're, you're definitely, you're glad to be done. Um, but it is one heck of a, of a writing style he's got.

[00:07:06] Yeah. And, and, you know, I felt what I felt for Shiggy was that there was no safe place for him because if he went outside the house, he'd get bullied by the neighborhood kids or the school. You know, it was, it was not, you know, uh, at one point he says to when they're struggling with money and they don't have enough food at all, his mom kind of accuses him almost like, well, you get your one free, you know, hot meal a day.

[00:07:34] And I don't eat that. And he admits that they take his food every day and use lunch. Yeah. He, he literally gets nothing all day. Um, and so for him to feel safer at home, even though home was terribly unsafe because he would come home. They have a whole series where at a different, uh, at one point he, every day around three o'clock, he basically, you know, his stomach, he gets sick to his stomach because he never knows what he's going to walk in.

[00:08:04] When he comes home, you know, how drunk is his mom going to be? Is there going to be some random guy there, um, abusing her so that she can get alcohol? I mean, it just, the poor guy never had any place to escape.

[00:08:19] Um, and it was tough. Um, the, the other thing I thought was kind of interesting. You, you talk about all those things, the poverty, um, the, I mean, there's all sorts of aspects, cultural aspects that play into it.

[00:08:33] And I've never got a good feeling for does the alcoholism basically lead to the poverty and abuse or did the poverty and abuse lead to alcoholism? Um, it, it was tough to figure out chicken and egg there.

[00:08:50] Yeah. As, um, you know, Agnes, uh, was married and Shuggy's dad was not a good guy, but at the same time, he also, the big reason he left the family was because of her drinking.

[00:09:05] It wasn't necessarily because of other things, but he was an abusive guy. It wasn't like he was a Greek guy, but, but he was leaving because of the alcoholism.

[00:09:14] Yeah. You know, he ran a taxi business, so he wasn't himself, you know, part of the alcoholism, except he kind of looked the other way for a while. Um, you know, I think the, when I read the book, I was kind of re re flipping through the pages today just to kind of get, you know, refocused on it. And, and it's the unhappiness and she is so laden with so much unhappiness. And, and, um, it just maybe for context, if you're thinking about reading it, um, you have read it, but if you're listening, um, you know, it's, it's, it's a story that takes place in the eighties and nineties.

[00:09:43] He starts when the guy's about five years old, um, starts with a modern scene in 1991 and then kind of goes back to 1981 and sort of tells the hardship that this kid goes through Shuggy Bain. Um, and then, you know, ends that in 1991 after he's kind of been through all that. Um, his mom was a Catholic who married a Protestant in a second marriage. Um, they had, I think they had Shuggy and there were two kids that were there before.

[00:10:12] Um, she probably at one time was a beautiful woman, um, and was able to win hearts, capture hearts and steal hearts. Um, and I think there's a big piece of, as their economic situation. And I mean, they literally were stealing from gas meters to, to pay for food. Um, it'd sneak out at night and break into the gas meter to take the, the, the little, you know, coins out.

[00:10:38] And then use that for stout and cigarettes. Um, and they would get their handouts from the, from the UK government. Um, they're in a part of Glasgow, which was incredibly depressed, uh, in the eighties when the shipping industry left.

[00:10:54] Um, and I think you get a sense of much of Glasgow was like that. And there were these sort of poor enclaves out there and you lived in the streets, the mothers didn't work.

[00:11:03] They would start hitting the bottle early in the afternoon. Um, it also had that sort of neat romantic vibe too, of like, you know, everybody kind of lived in a cul-de-sac and ran to each other's houses.

[00:11:13] And, you know, you're, you know, Kate could yell at Chapin and Hillary could yell at Nick and, and it was that kind of, you know, neat little village community too.

[00:11:23] But it also had this undercurrent of, of, of, um, depravity and, and addiction and, um, and, and, and all the moms in the way, many of them sort of fogged out.

[00:11:33] Right. And, and one of the things that I, I was struck by the book and I, I wrote this down today was the, um, despite all of it, Shuggy maintains his consciousness.

[00:11:44] He did, he didn't get numb from all of this. He didn't come home every day and go to his room and just get in his bed.

[00:11:51] And back then he didn't have phones that you could play on, but you could watch TV. He didn't do a lot of that.

[00:11:55] He, he, he was very present with the crisis he was living, um, whether it was taking care of his mom or, or getting along with his brother and sister, his half brother and sister.

[00:12:05] Um, but he remained very conscious throughout the book, which I thought was really cool.

[00:12:09] And if it is in fact a memoir, you can sort of get the sense that Douglas Stewart was paying attention throughout his whole life when that was going on for him.

[00:12:16] And then he wrote it for Shuggy Bane.

[00:12:19] Yeah. Um, I, I think you're right. And, and he never, he always had a very, um,

[00:12:25] I think, uh, developed sense of conscience of right and wrong. Um, he was, you know, he was confused because he was a little kid and trying to, um, interpret very adult situations.

[00:12:40] But he, he, he tried to, he always felt that his mother's health really was his responsibility.

[00:12:49] And, um, when his older siblings escaped the houses, his older sister ended up marrying in her late teens and moving to South Africa.

[00:13:00] His older brother ended up getting kicked out during a route with his mom.

[00:13:07] Um, and he stayed out, um, and Shuggy really felt abandoned by them in some ways, which was totally legitimate.

[00:13:16] But he also felt like if I just do better, I can keep mom healthy.

[00:13:23] I can keep her off the, I can keep her off the, the drink for a certain period or whatever it is.

[00:13:30] And, um, it was really sad to see him with so much responsibility.

[00:13:36] Yeah.

[00:13:37] And, and it was not just like, Hey, I'm going to limp you to bed.

[00:13:41] It was, you know, beauty was so important to her.

[00:13:44] Right.

[00:13:44] And like the hair color and the lipstick and the, you know, and, and he was, um, he, at one point early as a child, that I'll be a hairdresser someday working in a salon.

[00:13:55] And so he could connect with her in that way.

[00:13:58] But when she was falling down drunk or passed out in a chair, the little things he would do about fixing her lipstick or, you know, combing her hair the right way.

[00:14:06] And I don't want to give away the end.

[00:14:07] I think one of the things your, your, your, your podcast is good about is not, not telling the end, but, but there's some great scenes at the end where he continues to, to, to, to the very end.

[00:14:16] And he, he's always there doing that for his mom and sort of the, the grooming, um, of her, which was very important to her.

[00:14:23] And as that faded to that beauty faded, so did the, the alcoholism increased.

[00:14:27] Right.

[00:14:27] And she, her purpose was harder for her to find.

[00:14:31] Um, he tried to sort of fill up some of the holes, but it was, uh, it wasn't an unfulfilling life for Shiggy Bain, but it, um, it was, it was a constant, a constant storm that he was in.

[00:14:44] Yeah.

[00:14:45] He, he never really had anybody who took care of him.

[00:14:49] He was always the caregiver from a very young age.

[00:14:52] And as you said, the, the beauty was so important to her and it really was the scent.

[00:14:57] It was the source of all her self-esteem really.

[00:15:00] Um, because she hadn't, again, kind of keeping up appearances.

[00:15:04] Cause the, the beauty thing also, um, extended to her house.

[00:15:10] Like she kept very good, a clean house and things.

[00:15:13] She wasn't, she wasn't like a great cook or anything or provider, but she always wanted to look like she was, um, a step above her neighbors.

[00:15:23] I mean, there was this very, there, she would go outside and while her neighbors were in their house coats and things, and she would always have her high heels on.

[00:15:31] And like you said, her makeup and, and, and kind of this been draggled, uh, fur coat, um, and would try to kind of keep up this appearance.

[00:15:41] Um, but it was said there was just nothing beyond that.

[00:15:45] She didn't have anything else that she was either proud of, um, or that kind of gave her, uh, power.

[00:15:54] You know, the only time there was that one year, right.

[00:15:57] Where she, she went to Alcoholics Anonymous and got sober and she actually practiced it.

[00:16:02] And, and there was life breathed back into the book and back into the Bain house when she got sober and she met somebody and he turned out to be not a bad guy.

[00:16:13] Um, she cycled through a lot of guys.

[00:16:15] Right.

[00:16:15] Um, but, but this one guy was a drinker too and, and he liked to go out and he convinced her that, you know, having one glass of wine isn't going to kill you.

[00:16:24] And, um, and, and she liked him enough that she said, I'll forego my sobriety for this.

[00:16:32] And, and, um, and then she cycled very much, very quickly.

[00:16:35] It, it, it, yeah, that was, yeah, that was the turning point.

[00:16:39] Right.

[00:16:39] She just, um, she never, she never recovered from her alcoholism after that.

[00:16:43] Um, but there was that one year where everything was, wasn't so bad and, and they actually, as much as it resembles a family, they, they actually had that for a little while there.

[00:16:54] And, and I also think Jamie, you know, the other two characters, the brother and the sister, you know, I, I, I could almost read like Shuggy Bane too about his brother leak and like leak story.

[00:17:04] And this whole thing through leaks perspective, he was the older half brother who, um, was an artist and good at drawing things.

[00:17:13] Um, and I think he just wanted to get away from his mom and they got in that fight and, and he moved into the city of Glasgow.

[00:17:21] Um, and the sister, I think she just wanted to get out of Dodge and got married, as you said, as a young, like teenager to a cousin.

[00:17:27] Um, and they were looking for opportunities anywhere cause there was no working Glasgow.

[00:17:31] So there were mining jobs or, you know, construction jobs in South Africa.

[00:17:35] And so they moved to South Africa and you could almost write, you know, if, if, if, uh, if Doug Stewart's brother, I think he's was killed in a motorcycle accident in real life.

[00:17:45] But if he were alive and was able to write a book, it'd probably be just as interesting as, as the Shuggy Bane viewpoint.

[00:17:51] Um, you know how they all lived her, her heavy presence in their life.

[00:17:55] And she was, uh, she was a heavy, heavy presence, good and, and bad.

[00:17:59] Yeah.

[00:18:00] I mean, there's a lot of therapy hours, um, in all of their lives.

[00:18:04] I imagine to, to be able to handle that.

[00:18:07] Um, and, um, Leek clearly had guilt, uh, more so than, than I think the older sister about leaving Shuggy.

[00:18:17] Um, cause it was just the two of them for a long time and, uh, he just couldn't handle it.

[00:18:23] And, and he felt bad about that.

[00:18:25] Um, but he was less conscious.

[00:18:28] I think remember before I was saying how, how Shuggy stayed conscious the whole time.

[00:18:32] I think Leek just sort of, you know, just sort of said, I can't, I'm, I'm happy to get out of here.

[00:18:36] And he found, he found his way to make a lot of money, but he found a little one room, you know, literally a studio room and a old boarding house.

[00:18:44] And, and, um, there's a sad scene at the end where, where Shuggy pays him that visit.

[00:18:49] And, um, cause Shuggy has a falling out with, with the mom, Agnes.

[00:18:53] And, um, and, you know, there's the perverted cab driver and all that kind of crazy stuff that, that, that was going on.

[00:19:00] But then, um, but then he and Leek are in his room after he sort of needed a place to stay for a little while.

[00:19:06] And, and, um, and they, I think they had ramen noodles together and there's not a lot of money there.

[00:19:11] Yeah.

[00:19:12] And, um, and Leek said, you got to go, you know?

[00:19:15] And, and, and, and so your point earlier about that, there's just a safe place for him.

[00:19:18] And even his brother would give him that in the end.

[00:19:22] Um, and you know, you wonder if they were to write, if the book were to be another 500 pages long, like where, where, where would Shuggy end up?

[00:19:29] It didn't look good.

[00:19:29] He did have a friend, a girl.

[00:19:32] I think her name was.

[00:19:33] At the very end.

[00:19:33] Yeah.

[00:19:34] Leanne?

[00:19:35] Got a friend.

[00:19:36] I think her name was Leanne.

[00:19:37] And, um, and she was sort of a, a daughter of a, of a mom who was an alcoholic as well, but on the streets, they actually go see her on the streets.

[00:19:46] Cause that, that, that friend and that daughter, the daughter has lost her mom, um, to the streets, but she goes and she observes her mom from a hill and just watches her.

[00:19:56] And that's how, how she sort of conveys how I can continue to take care of her.

[00:20:00] Visits her once a week in person where she'll walk down with, you know, canned food and, and, uh, clean clothes.

[00:20:05] Um, and Shuggy doesn't like any of that.

[00:20:08] Um, I don't remember that scene at the end, but he, um, he has his own issues with what he went through when he doesn't respect her mom and, and doesn't look her in the eye.

[00:20:18] Um, but he and Leanne, you know, at the end of, at the end of the story there, he had actually got somebody he can talk to and, and somebody in a similar, similar situation.

[00:20:25] Yeah, that, that was the one hope where he, he finally did have a real friend because the, you know, the previous 10 years, he literally had nobody, um, other than his siblings and his half siblings.

[00:20:38] And they weren't very dependable.

[00:20:40] Uh, so it was interesting too, that Agnes's parents, because there was also, I kind of wondered when you first, when you first meet the family, they, before, um, Shuggy's dad leaves.

[00:20:55] Uh, they're living with her parents in a very small apartment.

[00:21:00] Yeah.

[00:21:00] Her parents seem pretty decent.

[00:21:02] I mean, they were, uh, hardworking kind of, um, working class folks in Glasgow and her dad at one point in Agnes was in her forties, um, laments that he always kind of, um, coddled her in, in, in, in, he never really disciplined her and that he spoiled her.

[00:21:24] And he ends up, uh, basically spanking her.

[00:21:28] I forget what the offense was.

[00:21:30] I mean, she did done something that was probably pretty bad.

[00:21:33] Um, but he kind of loses it and says, you know, this is what I should have done, you know, years ago.

[00:21:39] Um, and so you kind of wonder where she kind of fell off because her parents seem pretty decent until you get that one story.

[00:21:51] Um, and I don't, again, I don't want to ruin, you know, uh, it for other people, but there's a, a story that her mom tells that essentially Agnes has a sibling that she doesn't know about that.

[00:22:05] Her mom had cheated on her dad when he was World War II.

[00:22:09] Uh, and it's pretty horrific.

[00:22:11] Uh, and, and it kind of comes out of nowhere and it doesn't seem at all like the personality of the father that you had, had seen throughout the book.

[00:22:20] But it, it, it's just another scene that is so kind of gruesome and vivid, uh, that is kind of par for the course in this book.

[00:22:32] Yeah.

[00:22:32] I remember the scene, you know, it's interesting, you know, by, my, my mom is a McFarlane and, uh, they all emigrated to Canada, you know, around the late 1800s.

[00:22:42] So I actually grew up in Canada and there were lots of evenings at my cousins, the McFarlanes where Sunday evenings or Sunday dinners, a lot of the McFarlanes would gather.

[00:22:55] And, um, and they were of that age where they, they, uh, they all played some role in World War II.

[00:23:02] And, um, and they were, you know, I, I don't know if it's in the Scottish DNA, but, um, they all looked alike for one.

[00:23:11] Um, they all were older.

[00:23:13] They all had sort of white, white hair.

[00:23:15] They all wore sort of blue sweaters and didn't say a word, didn't say a word, just quiet, just quiet guys that were sort of, you know, we'd all be around in the, in the basement of our, our, my cousin's home in Toronto at the pool table, which we thought was so cool back then.

[00:23:29] Cause we didn't have one.

[00:23:31] Um, and the old guys would just sort of be sitting around the room on the, on the wall, just sort of standing up against the wall, sitting, sitting next to it.

[00:23:39] Didn't say a word.

[00:23:40] And, and I was, when you, when you brought up that story, it reminded me of all my, there's like 11 Uncle Georges that I have.

[00:23:45] Um, and they were all around that room and they just, um, the grace, right.

[00:23:50] That, that her dad had, uh, for the mom after that was revealed.

[00:23:56] And, um, and they kind of went on like, like I understand it happened.

[00:24:03] Let's move on.

[00:24:04] You know, it was, uh, it was interesting, but that, you know, part of, part of the, I think part of the story, the, the, the story for me was fun too, is, is sort of the Scottish roots, the Scottish background.

[00:24:13] Um, and, um, I love the country.

[00:24:15] Um, and it's a, it's a hardscrabble place to be.

[00:24:20] I think the Glasgow in the seventies, eighties and nineties, but, uh, but it's also, you know, it was a tight family structure.

[00:24:26] They, they, um, all the Baines lived with their mom until, until the, the husband was able to cobble some dollars and, and bought that, you know, little public housing, uh, freestanding house, um, in some suburb of Glasgow.

[00:24:41] Um, and, and that in itself was also really kind of weird too, right?

[00:24:45] Because they were in the city in Glasgow and at least there was this bustling sense of community.

[00:24:50] They, they go out to the suburb area, this new development for public housing that the UK government paid for and gave them, you know, a hundred pounds a month to, to cover all the needs.

[00:24:59] They spent a lot of that early on alcohol and, and drugs before they went and got not drugs, but they, they, they, they, before they went and did their grocery shopping, they hit the liquor store and played bingo.

[00:25:08] Um, and then whatever they had left, they put towards food.

[00:25:12] Um, but also the isolation moving from the city out to these little, these little, um, neighborhoods, 15 miles outside of Glasgow and nowhere to go, no car.

[00:25:22] You know, I mean, they couldn't afford cars.

[00:25:24] So you're stuck out there in these neighborhoods.

[00:25:25] And if you're, if you're lucky, you catch the bus.

[00:25:28] Um, but it was, um, the isolation, I think for, for Shuggie's mom, Agnes, also probably fed her alcoholism too, right?

[00:25:36] Cause she's out there by herself.

[00:25:37] The husband's left.

[00:25:38] She's surrounded all day by these ingrate kids that she calls them and nobody does anything for her.

[00:25:44] And she even had, and again, this is, um, was kind of part of that community is that you, she would have friends who came over and it's kind of like air quote friends because they were other alcoholics.

[00:25:58] And they were basically trying to figure out, well, do you have alcohol?

[00:26:03] I'll come over and drink your alcohol and then we'll figure out how to get more alcohol.

[00:26:08] I mean, they, they were not, they were not supportive friends at all.

[00:26:12] No, there was a, they were on the wrong bus.

[00:26:14] Um, they, they would, um, call men over to hang out and then and say, but only come if you're going to bring, you know, a couple of bottles with you.

[00:26:24] They were desperate.

[00:26:25] Yeah.

[00:26:26] If you were one friend who was the alcoholic would basically whore her out.

[00:26:30] She, they would say, cause she was the pretty one and she, they would invite little men over.

[00:26:35] Okay.

[00:26:35] Bring bottles for us.

[00:26:37] And then, you know, maybe she'll give you a kiss.

[00:26:39] And yeah.

[00:26:40] Yeah.

[00:26:41] I mean, it was really.

[00:26:42] And then in the early scenes, in the early pages of the book, they talk about the card games they play in them and the grandmother's apartment, the Agnes's mother's apartment and the, that they would drink a lot.

[00:26:52] And then, as you said, are they good friends or not good friends?

[00:26:56] They would cheat.

[00:26:56] They would, they would, you know, play with like nickel, that would be equivalent of like a pence, I guess.

[00:27:02] Right.

[00:27:02] Yeah.

[00:27:02] Five pence and two pence and 10 pence.

[00:27:04] And the money would just, the coins would just go around the table, but then somebody would use the restroom and they, you know, look at her cards or they pull a dime over or a pence to 10 pence over.

[00:27:15] And, and yeah, it was, it was a band of thieves.

[00:27:19] Well, and the woman who always managed to win was also the woman who was, it was the equivalent of kind of like the Avon lady, but she would sell things out of this catalog.

[00:27:30] Yeah.

[00:27:31] That's right.

[00:27:31] On credit.

[00:27:32] Yeah.

[00:27:32] So all these women were paying this woman, you know, every week or every month.

[00:27:37] I mean, everything they owed was kind of rented because it was all on kind of this layaway credit system.

[00:27:44] And, um, I mean, there was a lot of commentary on why the poverty was what it was and, you know, everything, even like the, the, uh, government housing, but you said, they're probably trying to do something nice by like putting it in the suburbs, but it really ended up just basically eliminating their support system.

[00:28:04] Yeah.

[00:28:05] Yeah.

[00:28:06] Yeah.

[00:28:06] And again, you had to, it was, you know, an hour to get into the city and, and you would, they would walk miles to go to the bingo hall.

[00:28:12] And, and, um, yeah, it was, it was a, look, it's a, it's a tough story, but, but my God, if you don't love Shuggy Bain at the end and you don't, your heart doesn't break for him, um, you know, you, you don't have a pulse.

[00:28:26] Um, you know, it's his first book.

[00:28:28] I think he's got a second one that came out.

[00:28:30] I think Mungo is in the name of the title, but I haven't read it.

[00:28:33] What Mungo?

[00:28:34] Young Mungo.

[00:28:35] And I'm looking forward to reading that one.

[00:28:37] But, um, yeah, I thought this was, this was, um, recommended to me by a guy I worked with who was, um, a guy who's a former diplomat and, um, and has lived around the world.

[00:28:48] And, and one of the smartest guys I've ever known.

[00:28:50] And, um, and what he can recommends that you do something, you should do it because he, he's never wrong.

[00:28:57] So I, I'd never heard of the writer.

[00:28:59] I'd never heard of the book.

[00:29:00] Um, I went out and bought it right after he told me to do it and I got on a long airplane ride and I couldn't put it down.

[00:29:06] Um, so I think we're talking in a gloomy way about this book, but, um, it's, um, it's powerful, like a, um, like a social commentary that's beautifully written and amazingly written.

[00:29:18] The texture of the, of the characters, I mean, there's just one layer on top of another, on top of another.

[00:29:24] And I gotta tell you, like this guy for a first novel, I don't know how fair it is that somebody can write that well.

[00:29:29] Um, right out of the gate, he won the, um, Booker prize, which I assume was a good one.

[00:29:34] Um, and I think he was nominated for a bunch of others.

[00:29:37] Um, and I don't know if his, if his second book is any good or not, but, um, I will read it and let you know.

[00:29:43] Yeah, I, I agree.

[00:29:45] And I was, I was really impressed with the way that he painted every scene in such a way that was so vivid.

[00:29:54] And, um, you felt like you were a character in the room sitting in the corner watching this all happen.

[00:30:02] Yeah.

[00:30:03] I mean, he, he paints a picture with words and, um, and, and I think you can only write that, that, uh, that well in that way.

[00:30:12] If you've lived it, um, because, um, it's so descriptive, but you feel like, you know, I feel like I've been to Glasgow, you know, and, and you kind of see the layout of the streets and the, the public transportation system and the old housing.

[00:30:27] That's probably really cool looking from the outside, but it's probably decrepit on the inside.

[00:30:31] And then these public housing neighborhoods that are outside the city, you can, he does such a good job describing it.

[00:30:36] And then just like walking to school and how, how every day is terror.

[00:30:40] Yeah.

[00:30:40] You know, and you feel the terror in his writing the way he writes about it.

[00:30:45] And in a way he accepts it.

[00:30:47] Um, it's like, this is the, this is the way life is.

[00:30:51] I don't, I can complain about it, but it's not going to do me any good.

[00:30:53] And I just got to survive.

[00:30:54] Right.

[00:30:54] And he's a survivor at the end of the day.

[00:30:56] He survives all of it.

[00:30:57] He survives his, his, his dad's abandoning the family.

[00:31:02] He survives his mother's alcoholism.

[00:31:04] He survives the breaking up of the family.

[00:31:05] Um, and at a very young age, you know, he finds himself having to, um, create a life for himself at, at 15, 16 years old, working in a, uh, the chicken section of a grocery market in Glasgow.

[00:31:21] Um, and the reason he gets the job is because the guy who runs the grocery store is happy to pay a child's wage.

[00:31:30] Um, to somebody who doesn't have to pay an adult.

[00:31:32] Um, and so, yeah, even just the descriptions and the, the creepy descriptions with the, with the guys that live in the, the boarding house with them and how, um, everything's just a mess for him.

[00:31:45] But, uh, but a great book.

[00:31:47] And it, well, the one thing is, you know, I thought about the fact that this came out in 2021.

[00:31:52] So during COVID, um, so maybe there was an aspect where people were feeling pretty down during COVID, but you read this book and you thought, nope, my life's a lot better.

[00:32:01] And, uh, so even with COVID.

[00:32:06] Yeah.

[00:32:06] And it even, it, it, there's, there's the piece to where Jamie, I think he writes about the multiculturalism of, of Glasgow at that time too, right?

[00:32:17] There is landlady's Pakistani.

[00:32:20] Um, there's a hot, a huge immigrant population in Glasgow.

[00:32:23] You don't think about that.

[00:32:24] Right.

[00:32:24] And, um, and, and he is, um, he's living in this, this Pakistani ladies boarding house.

[00:32:31] And it has to play by her roles a little bit.

[00:32:34] Um, and her family's there.

[00:32:36] And so it's this, also this blend of, um, of, um, multiculturalism that, that pops in the book that, you know, I just don't think of Glasgow as a big immigrant city, but I, I guess, I guess it is.

[00:32:46] And, um, uh, it's got something for everybody.

[00:32:50] Yeah, I agree.

[00:32:51] I think it was a great recommendation.

[00:32:53] I appreciate you taking the time to talk about it.

[00:32:56] Um, what's on your, uh, nightstand right now?

[00:32:59] What are you reading?

[00:33:01] So I'm probably reading what everybody's reading, which is the new Eric Larson book.

[00:33:04] Oh yeah.

[00:33:06] Uh, on Fort Sumter, the demon something.

[00:33:09] Um, everything he reads all the rights I'll read.

[00:33:13] Um, Hillary and I, Hillary and I actually got to see him speak last year in Baltimore.

[00:33:17] Um, and he's great live talking about his, how he comes up with his ideas.

[00:33:22] And so Eric Larson is just a favorite.

[00:33:24] Um, I think the, the one I just sort of finished up, I think I might've mentioned it too.

[00:33:28] It's called Lawrence in Arabia.

[00:33:30] Really?

[00:33:30] And it's about Lawrence of Arabia.

[00:33:32] Yeah.

[00:33:33] Um, and it's the, it's a long biography about the fascinating life of T.H. Lawrence, um,

[00:33:40] who, you know, definitely has this, um, this love for, for the Arab world before World War

[00:33:47] I.

[00:33:48] And it talks a lot of, he's a colorful, eccentric character in real life.

[00:33:52] And it all comes out and, you know, he's basically driving British and French foreign policy in

[00:34:01] the Middle East as this guy who started as an archeologist and, you know, he's leading Arab

[00:34:07] armies against the Turks.

[00:34:09] And I mean, he's no more qualified than, than you and me to do that.

[00:34:14] But, um, but he somehow lives this life of adventure and he's quirky and, and he, he,

[00:34:20] he operates with subterfuge and, and, and, and, and drives really what became the global

[00:34:29] policy around Palestine and Saudi Arabia, um, before it really developed.

[00:34:36] Um, and, uh, it was a book that you will never find anywhere, but it's called Lawrence in

[00:34:41] Arabia if you want to find it.

[00:34:42] It was written, I think in 92, but it reads like an Eric Larson book in a way.

[00:34:47] It's a little longer, takes some time.

[00:34:48] You need, you need a, you need two long plane rides to read it.

[00:34:51] But, um, but it was one of those ones that you come across once in a while and you just

[00:34:54] like, wow, glad I found it.

[00:34:57] Well, that sounds fascinating.

[00:34:58] And I have Eric Larson's book.

[00:35:01] Um, it's on my, in my queue.

[00:35:03] I, I also saw him, he was doing a book tour.

[00:35:07] I saw him in the Lewis Delaware.

[00:35:08] He did a little stage.

[00:35:10] Yeah.

[00:35:10] Yeah.

[00:35:11] So right before this, this book.

[00:35:13] Um, yeah, he must've been on the same tour.

[00:35:15] You just caught him on a different date.

[00:35:16] Yeah.

[00:35:17] Um, it was, I didn't see that.

[00:35:18] I didn't see the t-shirt on the back that had the list or the tour stops.

[00:35:22] Right.

[00:35:23] So, um, yeah.

[00:35:26] Yeah.

[00:35:26] And then what do you got on your, on your queue right now?

[00:35:29] Um, so there's that, I just told you, I just finished, um, the three body problem, um, which

[00:35:34] is a science fiction from a Chinese author that was really interesting and good.

[00:35:39] And it was actually kind of like a, it was a relatively good, uh, palate cleanser because

[00:35:45] science fiction, I tend to read very fast.

[00:35:48] It's not as heavy as something like this in the book I had read after Shuggy Bain, but

[00:35:54] before the three body problem was the women, uh, by Kristen Hannah, which is also another

[00:36:01] heavy, heavy book, a great book, but it was, you know, it was a tough topic.

[00:36:06] Um, is that a Vietnam era book?

[00:36:08] It is.

[00:36:09] And it's about women who served as nurses in, in Vietnam and then came back and had a terrible

[00:36:16] reception from their families, from the country.

[00:36:19] And then we're dealing with the same kind of PA, uh, PTSD that the soldiers were.

[00:36:24] But every time they tried to get any kind of help, people just told them, well, there's

[00:36:29] no women in Vietnam.

[00:36:30] Well, you weren't in combat.

[00:36:32] You don't know what it's like.

[00:36:33] And, and these women were, you know, dealing with just horrific conditions, um, dealing

[00:36:39] with poor soldiers that were getting shot up and, and killed and, and, uh, they were

[00:36:44] being shot at, uh, and it was, it was horrible.

[00:36:48] Um, and they had legitimately, um, suffered a lot on it and got very, very little assistance.

[00:36:55] So yeah, it was wild.

[00:36:56] Yeah.

[00:36:56] I've read, I just read a review on that recently and they said it was quite good.

[00:37:00] I definitely recommend it.

[00:37:02] It was, it was a, it was a great book and it was very educational.

[00:37:07] I did, I didn't know a lot about that period.

[00:37:11] Um, and I certainly didn't know about the nurses who served.

[00:37:15] So I thought it was good.

[00:37:17] Yeah.

[00:37:17] Unless somebody tells you and he points you to the book where there's so much we can learn

[00:37:21] in these books that, uh, that we wouldn't know otherwise.

[00:37:23] That's the beauty of them all is that, uh, worst thing that happens is you learn something

[00:37:27] important and that's important stuff.

[00:37:29] Right.

[00:37:29] And the same thing with this book, Lawrence and Arabia is this, this, this crazy backstory side

[00:37:35] story of, of, of while the, the, the French and the English were fighting the Germans in

[00:37:42] World War I in this sort of Eastern front trench warfare, there's this whole other thing going

[00:37:48] on down in, in, in the Arabian Peninsula and, and, and the, and what was Palestine, um, and

[00:37:56] what's Syria now and what was Jordan and, and like oil was in play.

[00:38:03] And, um, it, it, it's, um, it's amazing how much of what the Middle East is today is the

[00:38:12] by-product of what happened in, you know, 1913 to 1919.

[00:38:16] Yeah.

[00:38:17] Well, I think we, we all have a bias when we see the map that we grew up with and, and we

[00:38:23] think that that's what it looked like always.

[00:38:26] And it, it really didn't.

[00:38:28] I mean, uh, we have a very, very short perspective on this stuff.

[00:38:34] Yeah.

[00:38:35] Yeah.

[00:38:35] I love what your podcast is doing.

[00:38:37] I think it's really cool, Jamie.

[00:38:39] And I'm really grateful that you would, you'd, uh, have me come on and talk about Shiggy Bain.

[00:38:43] And, um, I, um, I started listening when you, when you made the call and, and I've enjoyed

[00:38:49] your other, um, recordings.

[00:38:51] So it's, uh, it's, it's a good thing.

[00:38:53] Um, I'm going to, I'm going to be a regular listener from here on out.

[00:38:55] Oh, well, thank you.

[00:38:57] And I appreciate you making the suggestion and also coming on the show.

[00:39:01] Um, it's been fun for me.

[00:39:03] Uh, I recently hit a year, so I think we'll do another year.

[00:39:07] This will be your, the first episode of, uh, season two, essentially.

[00:39:12] So thank you for doing.

[00:39:14] Season twos are always the ones that make or break the friends.

[00:39:19] Season two was the one that really got everybody going.

[00:39:21] So that's true.

[00:39:22] Yeah.

[00:39:23] It's an honor.

[00:39:24] Thanks, Jamie.

[00:39:25] All right.

[00:39:25] Thanks, John.