Describe your new book and explain why you wrote it.

It's about a Glasgow gangster, Christie Devlin, who goes to Alcoholics Anonymous and finds a conscience.
Why? Because it was originally going to be a 10 part series for Channel 4 and that never came to anything. It took 7 years' of work so I didn't want to waste the material.

Any factual inspirations?

No, it's all fiction. It's my first work where it's been total fiction.

Do you consider this to be your best work?

No. The short stories that I'm writing at the moment are the best.

What would you like to achieve with this book?

Sales. I want to become a bestselling author and break into Australia, America, Canada - all the English-speaking countries.

What does the book teach us?

The basis of it is about spirituality and its place in contemporary society, with a character who has a similar belief system to myself. Some people won't see it as a book about spirituality though; they're incapable of seeing past the language and content to see the deeper meaning.

The issue of class is a major theme in the book, and is very apparent in the West of Scotland. For example, The Slab Boys, set in 1957 and written in 1982, deals with the same issue. It's now 2004 and it's still prevalent, why?

Scotland is so full of snobbery. Everyone gets judged on their accent. I came from the slums of the slums, and whenever I move out of my own society, I can't be myself in whatever circle I'm in, especially in the arty world. You can't really be yourself, my mum used to change her accent to sound posher and I'd be like 'Mum, what you doing'. You shouldn't have to adopt a value system of a higher echelon of society to become a better human being. This isn't what happens in the book. Devlin becomes a better human being within his own culture. In films, for example, Billy Elliot, the working class adopts the middle class value system. This is always the fairytale case. Why should this be so? I turn that whole idea upside down, but the people who run the arts in Scotland are snobs and don't like that, and that's why they often don't like me or give me bad reviews.

Do you think this book will change or enhance external perceptions of Glasgow, as a problem city?

Don't care. As a writer, I've never set out to change people, or what they think about something. I hate anyone that does, like the film director Ken Loach, the attitude of saving the world, its so patronising.
In this book, with Glasgow, I set out purely to entertain people, and made it a movie-style book using Glasgow as this big Hollywood set.

Christie Devlin - even his name is ambiguous - what's your ultimate decision on him?

He becomes a good person. He gets over the really difficult obstacles in front of him. There's one moment in the book when he felt the fear of alcohol and realised he was powerless, admitted he needed help and asked for it. When he jumps into the waterfall with no fear, to chase the stag. All he needed to do was to come to terms with his sins, which he did. That's why it had to have such a surprise ending, it couldn't have ended any other way. He was only going to Alcoholics Anonymous to please other people and become a better gangster - the events in the book are what really make him face up to his fear.

How much of yourself do you see in Christie Devlin?

The value system, 99%. The life, nothing.

Did you find it difficult to write?

I wouldn't ever have written a thriller. At first, yeah it was difficult, because I'm used to always writing in the first person. But this one I had to do from the point of view of different people, so it made it more difficult at first.

The book centres on people, with lots of violence towards people. But there are no instances of animal cruelty, and nature is always involved in a good way, for example with the stag. In a way, nature is innocent and people are corrupt. What inspires you more, people or nature?

Nature. Take humans off the planet and get it back to the way it should be before we ruined it. We need a nuclear bomb to wipe all humans off the planet.
Alcoholics and junkies are the most selfish bastards in the world. Their selfishness is brought out in the book, and it mirrors the universal selfishness of the human race as a whole in the way they took over nature.

Song lyrics feature in the book, and music seems to have a prominent role. Why refer to music so much in your work?

The working class. Pop music is our poetry, the soundtrack of our lives. Putting song lyrics into a book does two things: it can change the meaning of the book, and it can change the meaning of the song. I would love to make a film with a music soundtrack because of the way music can fit in so perfectly. Like in an American Werewolf in London, the song by Creedence Clearwater Revival, if you heard it you'd realise no other song could do the same job as much as that one does.

You've said that you're angry at receiving 'ned writes book' reviews. Do you feel people don't take you seriously enough?

Yes. That's why I'm finished with Scotland. I want to move onto America - they have a simple style there, short sentences, no flamboyancy. No snobbery or prejudice about accent or dialect. With my accent, I'll always be patronised here. In all my reviews, the more people have known me personally, the worse review they gave me. As though I shouldn't be allowed to have any success. I'm glad I've kept my integrity through it all and not changed for anyone.

Was it easy for you to get into writing?

Yes - at first I was inspired by songs, by artists like Meatloaf and Bruce Springsteen. Bruce Springsteen especially, because we talk of the same things: he wrote about white trash. Then I began writing poetry, then did my Highers. I planned to become a PE Teacher but when I got an A for Higher English I was encourage to study that instead. I went to Uni and it went from there.

You used to be a teacher, why did you give that up?

It was too much stress. Teachers are snobby bastards. Academics, they're all snobs, they judge you. One colleague once said to me 'You've brought the ethics of a building site hut into this department'. I was seen as a maverick; they weren't quite sure how to take me. But I was a great teacher. I got my sixth years the first As in SYS English at that school. My enthusiasm shined through and I could relate to the pupils' way of thinking.

Does writing in the vernacular stem from the storytelling tradition in the Glasgow pub, for example?

Not just the pub, in all areas of culture. It's a working class thing. Everyone's always got a story to tell. Your granny, your aunt, your uncle.
Writing in the vernacular language has much more honesty to it. You can trust a story more when it's in its own language. I was really struck when I read William Faulkner's As I Lay Dying because that was in such a strong vernacular language. It's to do with syntax and idiom too. People from Glasgow always tend to stick the subject at the end of the sentence. It isn't necessarily wrong, it's just the way they speak.

Scotland's new parliament has been firmly cemented, and Edinburgh proclaimed as the first city of literature. Will this give Scottish writers more confidence, for example, to write in the vernacular, and will it change the direction of Scottish literature?

Yes, hopefully. We should be able to write about our own place, and pass it onto America, for example, without having to get that great big London tick. There's not so much restrainment anymore. It was Tom Leonard who led the way, then Kelman, and no one really knew what was going on with those two. Then Irvine Welsh brought it to the fore with Trainspotting. That book changed everything. A while a go, Matthew Fitt wouldn't have felt confident enough to write But n Ben A-go-go, and now look at that book, a great book.

What has been your greatest achievement so far?

In life, stopping drink and drugs, and finding peace of mind - exactly like Christie Devlin.
In literature, Me and Ma Gal. And it being a play, and it selling out, and the audience really responding to it. And me sitting there among the audience without them knowing.

What next?

America. And I'm working on short stories. I really love writing short stories, because it's like doing TV work, but without all the interference.

The Glasgow Dragon	Me and Ma Gal	Six Black Candles	Picking Brambles