Porno
Ten years on from Trainspotting Sick Boy is back in Edinburgh after a long spell in London. Having failed spectacularly as a hustler, pimp, husband, father and businessman, Sick Boy taps into an opportunity which to him represents one last throw of the dice. However, to realise his dream of directing and producing a pornographic movie, Sick Boy must team up with old pal and fellow exile Mark Renton. In the world of Porno, though, nothing is straightforward, as Sick Boy and Renton find out that they have unresolved issues to address concerning the increasingly unhinged Frank Begbie, the troubled, drug-addled Spud, but, most of all, with each other.Extract
It was good to see the lovely Alison again, even if the altercation with that fucked-up junky tattie-picking loser she's in tow with has upset me. Got pretty nippy as well, the skinny, skaggy wee cunt. Should have fucking well slung him out into the street along with the other rubbish for the binmen to pick up and incinerate. Things either get better, or they deteriorate, and I'm thinking about Spud, thinking that the worst is now over. But no, it does get much fucking worse. He comes in. -Sick Boy! A fuckin publican! You, runnin a pub in Leith. Kent ye widnae be able tae keep away fae the fuckin place! The man is wearing an unfashionable brown bomber jacket, old Nike trainers, a pair of Levi's and what looks like an ancient range Paul and Shark striped shirt. Of course, the total effect screams 'jailbird'. There's maybe a little fleck of silver at the temples and a couple of extra Mars bars on the coupon, but the cunt looks in excellent condition. Hardly a day older, it's as if he's been to a health farm rather than a prison. Probably doing weights twenty-four seven. Even the touch of silver looks unreal, like some film-set make-up artist has stuck it there for the puroses of ageing him. I anm literally fucking speechless. -Never thoat ah'd see the day! Telt ye ye'd fuckin well be back, ya cunt! he says again, showing me that his obsession with boring repetition is as intact as ever, possibly even developed, incubating as it did for so long in the hothouse of a slammer. Imagine sharing a cell with that! I'd take my fucking chances on the beasts' wing first. My jaws lock together and grind slowly. And it isnae just the charlie I had before Murph the Smurf came in. I force a smile and find my tongue. -Franco. How's tricks?
Reviews
“Funny and eloquently obscene”
- Daily Telegraph
“A brilliant satirical study of the ugly dynamic which draws together predators and prey”
- Sunday Telegraph
“Not for the fainthearted... Highly entertaining”
- Sunday Times
Irvine's Comment
I didn't mean to do this as a sequel to Trainspotting. Nicky was originally the main character, her boyfriend was an older guy called Steve. When I got half-way through it I realised that he was Sick Boy and I had to just go with that. Of course, I then found that I couldn't tell his backstory without working out what had happened to the rest of them. I brought Juice Terry in from Glue as I like him, and because that's exactly the sort of thing he'd get up to. I think now that the book would have been better without the baggage of the Trainspotting characters. A lot of the issues I was getting into with regards to the power and the relationships within homemade pornography got pushed aside in the 'who is Begbie going to batter next' mania. I think it might be a better film than a book, but I do like it very much. I love Sick Boy in it, and his total loathing of everything around him.
