Shuggie Bain

Edit- Later

It was driving me nuts where I knew the picture of the cover of this book from: The Leftovers! It's in the opening from Season 2+



I spent most of 2020 avoiding this book. It was everywhere and I could tell by looking at it that it was going to be sad and depressing and it just wasn't what I needed. Then, it made the TOB shortlist and I was forced to tromp my way through it.
Completely living up to expectations, Shuggie Bain is sad and depressing AF. Scene after devastating scene we witness sadness, addiction and (let's call it what it is) child abuse. Add in a few rapes. Add in the lack of being accepted by the only community available. Add in abandonment and malnutrition. I'm not even going to touch the difficult emotions that Shuggie is dealing with....

Here's the thing, this should have been called Agnes Bain, because we barely meet Shuggie. We see him for a hot minute in the beginning of the book and at the very end. Agnes's story ends when he's what, 12? It was never his story.
I kept thinking, I can do this (and this book is LONG), if Stuart would just let off the gas a little bit. If one hopeful or funny thing would happen. Just throw me a bone...but no. It would just get worse. I was sad, mad, depressed and exhausted reading this. Is the writing beautiful? Sure. Is this new territory for me as a reader? No. In fact, it hit a little too close to home and I found I identified with Leek waaaaaay more than I did Shuggie. And I read a bunch of reviews that promised(!) that the abuse would be balanced out by the amount of love in this novel. There is no love in this novel.
This is not love. This is codependency. Agnes did not even love Agnes.
In the end, I got exactly what I expected to get out of this.

Way too depressing for quarantine

This will break you. Again and again. The misery is relentless and yet there are moments of hope and light that keep you going.

I haven't read all of the Booker shortlisted books but from the nominated books I have read, Shuggie Bain is in a different league. Set in Glasgow in the 1980s through to the 1990s, this novel is a Bildungsroman that follows protagonist Shuggie Bain's journey from childhood into young adulthood. While Shuggie, raised in poverty and squalor battles with his homosexual identity in a homophobic era. He also has to contend with his mums spiralling alcoholism from a very young age.

This novel is confrontational and hard hitting. It doesn't shy away from the brutal and destructive nature of alcoholism and it's detrimental affect on close family members. This was one of the most heartbreaking and soul wrenching books I have read in years. Shuggie is a beautiful and loyal character who loves his mother Agnes and desperately and ultimately fruitlessly tries to keep his mother from the devil drink. Poignant and raw and littered with the authentic Glaswegian working class vernacular, this book is searing with the heartbreak of addiction, poverty and the complicated relationship each character battles between survival and love.

I would be over the moon for this to be the 2020 Booker winner as it is so honest and heartfelt as well as extremely haunting and painful to read. For a debut this book is incredibly impressive and I cannot wait to see what this author will write next.

Thanks to the author, the publishers Grove Press and Netgalley for a review copy in exchange for an honest review.

This isn't an easy book: four hundred pages devoted to a boy who does everything to help his alcoholic mother. It's emotionally manipulative, but it remains tremendously powerful. Never before have I read such a thorough exploration of addiction. The final scene Shuggie has with his mother was so gut wrenching and powerful–it's one that will stay with me for years.