The Cutting Room (Canons)

Product Information

As I am an interested observer who likes Giger, I know some of the images which are in that style described in The Cutting Room - see the linked book Biomechanics. Although this is a crime book, it is about so so so much more.. I cannot stress that enough! The character of Rilke is a story unto himself- and what a fantastic story it is! A gay bachelor in about the 90s, Rilke is always putting himself in some situations th at are a danger to himself and make the reader feel very uneasy at points. I honestly could not help but fall madly in love with him and I can’t wait to read more from him in the future. Anyway, a second book is now coming out (almost 20 years later), and I'm interested in seeing how Rilke's been spending his time.

The Cutting Room is the story of Rilke, an auctioneer from Glasgow who comes upon a hidden collection of photographs when clearing a house. He becomes obsessed by the photographs and the story hidden within, finding himself caught up with the Glasgow underworld and struggling to stay afloat. Rilke's not exactly the archetypal hero accidental investigator. He's in his 40's; his personal hygiene is a bit offhand; he's an auctioneer for one of Glasgow's less than salubrious auction houses and he's gay with a taste for anonymous sexual encounters anywhere, anytime. The Sunday Times described The Cutting Room as: "one of the most intriguing, assured and unputdownable debuts to come out of Scotland in recent years". [3] The List was particularly impressed by Welsh's portrayal of Glasgow: "...the city becomes a character in its own right; Gothic, dismal, decaying and frightening in equal measure". [4]The Cutting Room is noir fiction at its finest. The characters are beautifully drawn, complex and interesting. The pace of the novel is fast, with a well thought out plot. I enjoyed every moment of this book, although I am relieved not to have met any of its shady characters in real life. Along with Rilke there's a supporting cast of wonderful characters - Rose, his slightly overblown, vaguely past it, sexual predator boss, whose best friend is ultimately Rilke - the one man who just isn't vaguely interested in her sexually no matter what she does. There's Les the drug-dealing transvestite. There's a bunch of reprobate second hand dealers in everything from books to porn, furniture to junk. There's the old schoolfriend, now policeman, who does Rilke more than one favour by dragging him out of some difficult 'legal' situations. All of the supporting characters are drawn as vividly as the Rilke and again, there are some things to like and some things to loathe about many of them. Rilke is a gay auctioneer in his 40’s, who enjoys drinking, smoking, and casual sex. While clearing out the house of his latest client, an elderly woman, he comes across a collection of erotic books and photos that belonged to her deceased brother. She doesn’t want to see any of it and asks that he destroy everything in his private study. Instead of honoring her request, he wishes to learn more about the disturbing images of a woman that appears to have been murdered. During his search for the truth, he encounters drug dealers, porn shop owners, an amateur filmmaker, and a woman who poses nude for the camera. A cunning serial killer, who was likened to the mythological Ferryman, had Liverpool churning, and his clever use of social media had his popularity soaring and his followers swarming each fresh crime scene for his artistic yet gruesome exhibits featuring the mutilated organs of his victims or graphics/videos of their demise. This was a complex and compelling thriller and I couldn’t seem to gain traction on the mystery, as it was slippery, confounding, multi-textured, and complicated by unreliable and deceitful characters with closets full of their own dark secrets. We meet Rilke, coasting through life on a sea of alcohol and sometimes stronger stuff, homosexual (still not completely accepted by society), and smoker. These three things are his coping mechanisms in a life that shows the gritty, seedy underbelly of Glasgow. He works with Rose, femme fatale, and we are introduced to a few other characters who made an appearance in the second book. That I read first.

The synopsis explains: "Auctioneer Rilke has been trying to stay out of trouble, keeping his life more or less respectable. Business has been slow at Bowery Auctions, so when an old friend, Jojo, gives Rilke a tip-off for a house clearance, life seems to be looking up. The next day Jojo washes up dead. Jojo liked Grindr hook-ups and recreational drugs – is that the reason the police won’t investigate? And if Rilke doesn’t find out what happened to Jojo, who will? Thrilling and atmospheric, The Second Cut delves into the dark side of twenty-first century Glasgow. Twenty years on from his appearance in The Cutting Room, Rilke is still walking a moral tightrope between good and bad, saint and sinner." Obsessions are dangerous, yet they are also so human. They drive the most amazing and visionary projects—and fuel the darkest, most horrible passions. Obsessions play a fundamental role in The Cutting Room, both in the actions of the dead antagonist and in Rilke, the protagonist and auctioneer who stumbles across snuff photographs while processing an estate and begins to wonder if they are real.At its new location on East 32nd Street between Park and Madison, The Cutting Room builds on a decade of history that includes some of today’s top performers – John Mayer, Lady Gaga, Sting, Sheryl Crow and David Bowie are just some of the artists that have graced the stage of the Cutting Room at its previous location. Canongate is to publishLouise Welsh'sfollow-up to her "once in a generation"debut novel The Cutting Room, first published two decades ago. The Cutting Room is a dark, sharp-edged story, following Rilke, the cadaverous 43 year old gay employee of a failing auction house whose behavior defines risky. He is called to evaluate the contents of a house, a house whose contents are richer than the auction house has ever seen. He is given the job on the condition that the auction be completed in a week's time and that he clear out the contents of an attic office personally. In the attic he finds a collection of first edition erotic books and, in a cardboard box, a handful of pictures taken in Paris in the 1950s, two of which seem to show the murder of a young woman. Rilke sets out to discover what happened and in the process discovers more sleaze and criminal behavior than he had ever expected. Nathan opened TCR in 2009 inside One Leisure Huntingdon. Over the years he has trained and grown a strong team of stylists around him to create a professional salon with a relaxed, friendly atmosphere. Education has been a key part of his success in training his stylists. Nathan worked in a secondary school training hairdressers of a school age for two years. He then moved on to become a Matrix CRAFT educator teaching other salons and their stylists the latest in the hair industry. This included hair care products, cutting and colouring techniques, business advice as well as working alongside some of the UK's leading hairdressers on photo shoots and TV award ceremonies.