He's heralded as the new Irvine Welsh. So who is he?

Sometimes lumped-in with the media-invented Scottish literary scene, Alan Warner published his fourth novel The Man Who Walks last month. James Kelman's 1994 Booker prize-winning How Late It Was, How Late threw an often unwelcome spotlight on a band of writers, north of the border, including Irvine Welsh and Iain Banks. Warner was among them, but his rise has been a quieter affair.

Warner's fictional landscape circles the cold and distant Port, loosely based on his home town of Oban in north Scotland. The story begins with his first novel, 1995's Morvern Callar, as the eponymous heroine discovers the corpse of her suicidal boyfriend. As luck would have it, he's left his unpublished novel lying around, and Morvern jacks in her job at the local supermarket and quickly does a book deal, blowing all her new-found readies on a booze-drenched "Youth Med" holiday. The book is littered with references and inventive attention to detail, such as Morvern's exhaustive capacity for making compilation albums.

Next up was 1997's These Demented Lands. This time, Warner's story-world exploded in epic style, set at the end of the millennium on an island scarred by air crashes and populated by assorted damaged people, all heading for The Drome hotel. The viewpoint character is strangely familiar and the whole thing ends with a surreal New Year's Eve party - you get the feeling that this book documents the author's own personal hell.

The Sopranos is probably the most accessible and popular work. No, it doesn't feature any New Jersey hoods, but this tale of alcopop-fuelled convent girls on an outing would give the C4 gangsters a run for their money. The author cemented his reputation for startling female characters as the girls try to blag their way into Port's grimy Mantrap club.

Fans have had to wait four years since The Sopranos, for The Man Who Walks. This novel is the most ambitious and ambiguous so far. The title character - a misanthropic loony - has blown town with £27,000 of pub money. His nephew seeks him out, across blasted heaths, rivers and industrial debris. As ever, the ghost of Morvern haunts the narrative. Peppered with trademark brutality and nasty sex, this book has divided the critics, but it's an assured and absorbing tale, and possibly the highpoint of Warner's output so far.

The long-awaited film adaptation of Morvern Callar, directed by Lynne Ramsay is due out in November this year. Anyone who's seen Samantha Morton's performance in 1997's Under The Skin will realise very quickly that her casting in the title role is an inspired choice. The film was well received at this year's Cannes film festival and could be the next big Brit flick. If it is, it will be a timely reward for one of the UK's most exciting writers. Go check him out. RB 02 August 02

The Man Who Walks is published by Jonathan Cape.

useful link: BBC News: Newsnight review

Independent:
...Warner's prose writhes in its own entrails...
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