Product Description

A fresh, savvy and honest take on being young, naive and hopeful in 1990s Falkirk, and the pains of living life at hyperspeed in a mad, pop-culture world.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #167138 in Books
• Published on: 2008-02-20
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 190 pages

FHM, 2001
'A terrific yarn... superb from start to finish'

The Herald, 2001
'Required reading for those who understand and live its message'

Rosemary Goring, Sunday Herald, 2001
'There is real emotion here, and gutsiness... a feeling for language so passionate it shames the dullness of so many sentences that make it into print'

Customer Reviews

Educational book for grannies!
This is a classic novel about the sometimes troublesome youths of our towns. The only point I would dispute in the other reviews is that this is primarily for young people. I believe, rather, that it should be required reading for the often intolerant older folks, a bit like myself, who had forgotten the uncertainties of being young in today's society. Peer group pressure is stronger than ever nowadays, and Alan Bisset's skill in drawing readers of any age into the lives and private thoughts of the young people in the book is nothing short of remarkable. I still hate 'boyracers' cutting me up, mind you, but now I feel I know why they do it! I am recommending this novel to my friends.

Pure Fantastic!
Bissett's Boyracers is the journey of four friends, who travel in their prized and adored car, lovingly christened as Belinda. Alvin, at 15, is the runt of the gang. With a non-existent mother, a manic depressed father and in love with the, and I quote "pure healthiest" girl at school you are left with one unhappy teenager. Boyracers consists of Alvin tells us of his life in the fast lane and how he escapes his problems.

Yes, Falkirk exists and this book is a true insight into chaotic lifestyles teenagers are commonly associated with. I wrote about this book for my standard grade (don't laugh! I ended up gripped and passionate about this particular novel! Fantastic or as we in Glasgow like to say "Pure Dead Brilliant!"

Basic Coming of Age Novel
Bissett's debut novel is-underneath the stylistic semi-pyrotechnics and pop culture references-a fairly traditional angsty coming-of-age story. Set in Falkirk (a medium-sized town roughly halfway between Glasgow and Edinburgh) circa 1999-2000 (based on pop culture references, such as the impending release of the U2 album "All That You Can't Leave Behind"), it's the story of four guys who cling to their friendship as the only ray of light in an otherwise bland life. At 15, Alvin is the runt of the lot, and his Tolkein / Stephen King / Clive Barker obsessions make him the default nerd of the quartet. Add to that, a miserable home life (his alcoholic mother disappeared, leaving his unemployed father permanently depressed and blasting The Sex Pistols, while his older brother escaped to London), and a crush on the prettiest, wealthiest girl in school, and you get one unhappy kid. It's never really clear how he became so close to Franny, Dolby, and Brian, all of whom are several years older and have dead-end jobs, but he buys into the group delusion that friendship is all you need in life.

The bulk of the book consists of the guys cruising around town in Dolby's car, scoping girls and avoiding the menacing eyes of "weapons" (teenage thugs). There's lots of aimless teen chatter about stuff like who was the best Batman, the release date of the new U2 album, what video to rent, and so forth. Interwoven with this is the inevitable process of Alvin's maturation, including his first drinking session, his first sex, his first time driving, and of course, the harsh stripping away of some of life's illusions. None of these are anything new, but Bissett handles each ably, managing to wring some empathy for wee Alvin out of scenes that we've all seen a hundred times before in film, television, and print.

Stylistically, there's a bit of Scots dialect, but it's pretty low key, certainly not the level of Welsh or Kelman. Bissett tries to weave in song lyrics throughout-sometimes breaking a paragraph in the middle of a word to throw in a stanza-in an attempt to show how pervasive and important music is to teenagers. Sometimes this works, but often it's intrusive. Similarly, paragraphs are broken in the most arbitrary manner, almost as if the typesetter came along at the end and as a joke, just started putting in paragraph markers at random. Not sure what the point of that is, other than maybe to suggest the chaotic nature of teenagerdom... All in all, this is a decent read, but nothing special. Probably not worth seeking out unless you're trying to keep up with all the latest Scottish fiction or are a big fan of coming of age stories. Oh yes, the title is a slang term coined in the UK and New Zealand for teenage drivers who aggressively flout the law and participate in illegal street racing (kind of like the gearheads in The Fast and The Furious).