More poignant than his others. Like if all the characters in Trainspotting were Spud.

As usual with my reviews of Irvine Welsh I should add a disclaimer right at the start that I adore his work and will always struggle to criticise it too heavily. Some may deride 'Glue' as another offering from a one-trick pony but I found it to be anything but formulaic - the crassness and base culture that are central to most Welsh novels are here but the anecdotes and characters themselves are fresh and exciting. Having said that the characters are fresh, the cameos of our favourite characters from Trainspotting et al. brought the biggest smile to my face.

The way Welsh weaves his novels together is just fantastic in my opinion, one of the main characters in 'Glue', 'Juice Terry' featured heavily in 'Porno' and it's just brilliant to get the whole backstory with little snippets of background information from other novels too.

'Glue' is probably Irvine Welsh's most sincere attempt at a 'meaningful' novel in that it charts the course of no less than four lives over no less than four decades. Others could have no doubt come up with more seminal plotlines and messages about life but Welsh does a good job to still do this adequately without sacrificing his aforementioned crassness and ability to shock and titillate.

'Glue' is strong enough to recommend as an introduction to Irvine Welsh but it isn't his greatest offering. Once you've read the Trainspotting 'trilogy' though, 'Glue' is enhanced with a sort of 'bonus' content that you wouldn't otherwise see. Very much recommended.

Glue is based on the lives and friendship of four working class lads from the scheme in Edinburgh, following them through four decades and a set of principles that binds them together. If there was a word to describe this book, it would be "dirty" - as the beauty of Irvine Welsh's work is that it's real. It is based on real people, real friendships, real happenings, so the link with reality is almost tangible. I have yet to come across another author who can conjure up the most gruesome, yet astute, scenes whilst still maintaining a very strong sense of authenticity.

I still prefer trainspotting and filth by welsh but this was a good story, he just loves to shock!

Irvine Welsh never disappoints. Have I said that before? Probably. But it still rings true after 4 novels and a short story collection.

Glue is not your typical Welsh novel. Well, in some ways it is: the Scottish dialect, the constant language, the hard-to-like characters, the Edinburgh setting. But what's notably different is that there's a lot more heart in this one than in his usual books. This is the story of four friends and their ever-changing friendship, spanning from the 70s to 2002. Over the course of this novel, we read from the perspective of multiple characters, both first- and third-person, which can seem a bit overwhelming at first but soon becomes interesting as a way to see into everybody's mind, which is something that Irvine Welsh doesn't usually do.

And that's what's so special about this book. Irvine Welsh does a lot of stuff in Glue that he doesn't do in any of his other books (that I've read). This is the only novel of his that I would describe as epic, and at nearly 500 pages it rarely ever drags. And, as Welsh readers know, all of his books are worth reading just for the occasional guest appearances of characters from his other work. This won't be the last one I decide to read, and it definitely won't be the last one I end up loving. 4 and a half stars.

This book is utterly filthy and it is often written in the hackneyed speech of the Scottish lower class. There is a disturbing scene involving a dog, and this caused a lot of my classmates to refuse to read any further. Despite the perversions, I really enjoyed this novel.