My list of some of the best Scottish Fiction Books. Not only famous Scottish authors from the past, but also modern authors writing in many genres.

Latest Scottish Bestsellers

44 Scotland Street Alexander McCall Smith tackles issues of trust and honesty, snobbery and hypocrisy, love and loss, but all with great lightness of touch. Clever, elegant and funny, this is a novel that provides huge entertainment but which is underpinned by the moral dilemmas of everyday life and the characters' struggles to resolve them.

Scottish Girls About Town : And sixteen other Scottish women authors International bestselling authors Jenny Colgan, Isla Dewar, and Muriel Gray lead off this dazzling collection of stories by popular and rising Scottish women authors. A sometimes wild, sometimes poignant romp through the lives of Scotswomen, Scottish Girls About Town revels in the universal hilarity and strife of being a girl! Best Scottish Fiction.

Off in a Boat by Neil Gunn. His ability to scrupulously evoke the landscapes and the peoples of the Highlands, his blending together of myth and reality and his wide-ranging imagination make Neil Gunn the most important Scottish novelist of the 20th century. --Trevor Royle, 'The Macmillan Companion to Scottish Literature'

Resurrection Men: An Inspector Rebus... Like Edinburgh inspector John Rebus, the resurrection men of the title are treading on thin ice--they've all been sent to a short course at the Scottish Police College because they've failed in some way, generally "an issue with authority." Rebus has been known to have issues of that nature before, which only boosts his credibility with the other cops in attendance, suspected by their bosses of being on the wrong side of the fence, on the take, or even guilty of murder on several previous occasions. The dour Inspector's agenda aims to bring the higher-ups proof of the so-called Wild Bunch's nefarious activities; in the process, his own conduct in the old case he and his college classmates must rework and revisit comes under scrutiny. A solid police procedural whose protagonist, the hero of 14 other titles in this acclaimed series, continues to grow on readers who are just discovering him. Jane Adams. Best Scottish Fiction.

Death of a Village Intent on having a quiet time by just sitting in a deck chair in his garden, Hamish Macbeth is quite disturbed when a very agitated Elspeth Grant, Loch- dubh's local reporter and astrologer, arrives. It seems that three citizens of nearby Stoyre have moved to Loch- dubh-but they are quite unwilling to offer Elspeth any facts as to why, causing the reporter in her to suspect they were frightened out of their former village. So now it's up to constable Hamish Macbeth to step into the case. Best Scottish Fiction.

The Wasp Factory Few novelists have ever burst onto the literary scene with as much controversy as Scot, Iain Banks in 1984. The Wasp Factory was reviled by many reviewers on account of its violence and sadism, but applauded by others as a new and Scottish voice--that is, a departure from the English literary tradition. The controversy is a bit puzzling in retrospect, because there is little to object to in this novel, if you're familiar with genre horror. Best Scottish Fiction.

The Bruce Trilogy/the Steps to the Empty... Tranter succeeds in bringing to life all the characters from this crucial period of Scottish history. His portrayal of Robert the Bruce presents a hero of the greatest magnitude - a man every great leader of the modern world should be familiar with. Best Scottish Fiction.

The Vintage Book Of Contemporary... Vintage Book of Contemporary Scottish Fiction honors Scotland's explosive and innovative national literature with 47 of its finest representatives. Best Scottish Fiction.

Outlander In Outlander, a 600-page time-travel romance, strong-willed and sensual Claire Randall leads a double life with a husband in one century, and a lover in another. Torn between fidelity and desire, she struggles to understand the pure intent of her heart. But don't let the number of pages and the Scottish dialect scare you. It's one of the fastest reads you'll have in your library.

The Oxford Book of Scottish Short...Stories Anthology of 44 Scottish stories begins with folktales, which, strictly speaking, are not short stories but whose orally influenced, vernacular style and common-person protagonists inspired the Romantics. The work includes a major Scott story ("The Two Drovers" ) and others by his principal contemporaries, James Hogg and John Galt, a couple of Stevenson tales.

A Scots Quair A work that many have never heard of, and that is unfortunate. it offers a unique voice to the human condition, and, perhaps more importantly, the scottish condition. Best Scottish Fiction.

How Late It Was, How Late by James Kelman
"Ye wake in a corner and stay there hoping yer body will disappear, the thoughts smothering ye; these thoughts; but ye want to remember and face up to things, just something keeps ye from doing it, why can ye no do it; the words filling yer head: then the other words; there's something wrong; there's something far far wrong; ye're no a good man, ye're just no a good man." From the moment Sammy wakes slumped in a park corner, stiff and sore after a two-day drunk and wearing another man's shoes, James Kelman's Booker Prize-winning novel How Late it Was, How Late loosens a torrent of furious stream-of-consciousness prose that never lets up. Beaten savagely by Glasgow police, the shoplifting ex-con Sammy is hauled off to jail, where he wakes to a world gone black. For the rest of the novel he stumbles around the rainy streets of Glasgow, brandishing a sawed-off mop handle and trying in vain to make sense of the nightmare his life has become. Sammy's girlfriend disappears; the police question him for a crime they won't name; the doctor refuses to admit that he's blind; and his attempts to get disability compensation tangle in Kafkaesque red tape. Gritty, profane, darkly comic, and steeped in both American country music and working class Scottish vernacular, Sammy's is a voice the reader won't soon forget. Mary Park. Best Scottish Fiction.

Another Time, Another Place by Jessie Kesson
In the summer of 1944, three Italian prisoners of war are billeted in a remote village in northeast Scotland, bringing a tantalizing glimpse of another, more exotic world, reawakening dreams of a future far removed from reality. Best Scottish Fiction.

Beside the Ocean of Time by George MacKay Brown
Set in an imaginary island in the Orkneys, north of Scotland, this exquisite story by one of Scotland's finest writers tells the story of young Thorfinn Ragnarson's daydreams that relive the thousand year history of his birthplace. Viking kings, exotic princes and fabulous adventures await him - and the reader.

Waverley by Sir Walter Scott. Just about every work of historical fiction ever written owes its existence to Walter Scott and to Waverley, his first novel. At the time, it was a new way to write novels - indeed, combining historical fact with entertainment was a brilliant idea. By creating a fictional character and inserting him into the middle of the 1745 Jacobite Rebellion, Walter Scott was able to bring the culture and traditions of Scotland to life in the most staid bourgeois imagination. As a result, he achieved unprecedented popularity for his time, singlehandedly started a tourist industry in Scotland, and kicked off a new genre of fiction, which was then studiously adopted by countless authors, of whom Dumas and Fenimore Cooper are canonical examples.

Kidnapped (Penguin Classics) by Robert Louis Stevenson
"I will begin the story of my adventures with . . ." That's how Robert Louis Stevenson begins one of the best novels in his career, Kidnapped. Set in the aftermath of the Jacobite rebellion of 1745 in Scotland, Kidnapped is an intriguing story narrated by David Balfour, a young Whig and Lowlander of Scotland, who is tricked by his miserly uncle; survives attempted murder, kidnap and shipwreck; and in the company of Alan Breck, a Jacobite, escapes through the Highlands and returns home to claim his fortune. Best Scottish Fiction.

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