Product Description

An auctioneer by profession, Rilke is an acknowledged expert in antiques but also considers himself something of an expert in many other fields.

When he comes upon a hidden collection of violent, and highly disturbing, erotic photographs, Rilke feels compelled to unearth more about the deceased owner who coveted them. What follows is a compulsive journey of discovery, decadence and deviousness.

With echoes of the great novels of Hammett and Chandler, and yet in a voice very much her own, Louise Welsh has produced a glittering debut with the widest appeal; and in her hero, Rilke, one of the most interesting characters in contemporary fiction.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #28926 in Books
• Published on: 2003-05-01
• Binding: Paperback
• 294 pages

The Sunday Times
One of the most intriguing assured and unputdownable debuts to come out of Scotland in recent years.

The Times
Astonishingly this is a first novel, catapulting Welsh straight into the superstar league, while establishing Rilke as a classic original.

The Independent
The Cutting Room is a hugely commendable debut, assured and memorable. Crime fiction may have its prize-winner at last.

Customer Reviews

disappointing!
I normally love books set in contemporary Scotland, big fan of Irvine Welsh, James Kelman etc. So was expecting good things after several people recommended this book to me. While it was an easy and quick read, I couldn't help but feeling cheated at the end. I felt the majority of the carachterisation was flat, one-dimensional and stereotypical. The ending was slightly unsatisfactory after the build-up before hand. Most of all, however, is that as a Glaswegian, I couldn't help but cringe every couple of pages at Welsh's waxing lyrical about the city ,obviously almost all her knowledge of the city is centred around the "bohemian" west-end with so many patronising, smug and quite frankly irritating little in-references and nods to places she obviously knows, whereas the rest of the city ie the so-called seedy underbelly of Glasgow is only touched upon in the vaguest sense. Either she has made it up completely or has no idea what she is talking about! Like some of her other work, it seems laboured at points in an attempt to shock or catch the reader off guard, with many scenes unnessecary or innapropriate to the plot. Whereas Irvine Welsh has a natural flair for the vernacular and frame of mind of the subjects of his novels (and an obvious understanding of where they're from! Research is always good, Louise!), the contrast between the 'straight' style of the narrative and the laboured attempts at Scottish slang when some carachters interact seems laboured and sits uneasily,as if she is obviously thinking more of a market outside of Scotland than the emotive heart of the story and its players. Like i said, not a bad book by any means, very readable but equally disappointing. Her latest, the Bullet Trick is better by far, but I would suggest it still suffers from many of the same failings aforementioned here, although not to the same extent.

Awful Awful Awful
I like most books, but I hated this one. The writing is so awkward in places, I was cringing. The sex scenes are written by someone desperate to show they know what they are talking about. First book and hopefully no more to come from Lousie Welsh.

Atmospheric
An atmospheric thriller, based upon an auctioneer's discovery of violent pornographic photographs during a house clearance, with homosexuality, brooding sexual tension and an ever-present sense of imminent menace thrown in for good measure.

Louise Welsh has a light touch in her writing, lending a subtlety to the dark and troubling scenes she creates; relationships, both on the one-to-one level of brute sexual desire and in the wider sense of man's relationship to man, are convincingly portrayed.

Two rather stilted homilies towards the end of the book, on people trafficking and the behaviour during the Orange Walk, therefore sit rather uneasily in the context.

All in all, however, this is a satisfyingly challenging read.