Porno

ExOffender wrote:

Have to say I differ strongly. Irvine Welsh has gotten worse with every book he's published. That was all fine until he went back to the characters that started him off. And, IMO, ruined them. Renton and Dianne... getting together... after she's gone to college and he's set up a club in the Dam... it hurts! Spud was the only character who seemed the same, and that was because all that was driven home about him was that he was stuck in a rut, got to get it together and develop some kind of class consciousness (violins). The story of the rigged civil voting that he uncovers is actually quite interesting (if true), but having to wade through all the lazily-characterised, unimaginative prose around it is quite the bore. Sick Boy was funny. He wasn't Sick Boy, but he was funny, I'll grant. Begbie was always a bore anyway, and I get the distinct impression Welsh didn't quite know what to do with him.
My final word: Trainspotting was about love, life, friendship, drugs, politics, pop culture of every stripe, class tension, racial and religious disharmony, post-colonial societal problems and the dissolution of the proletariat. Among other things. Porno is about... well, you get the picture.
AFAIK, Welsh now lives in London rather than Edinburgh. He should start setting his books there, too. The less his prose reflects life as he experiences it directly, the less affecting I seem to find it. He seems like the British version of Chuck Palahniuk; success has spoiled him.
Sorry for ranting, but Trainspotting was so good I expected better.