gay half-brother. His happiness is short-lived, however; the memory of what he has done continues to haunt him, and his depression soon completely engulfs him, taking him away from his lover and his drug-driven escapism. He attempts suicide by asphyxiation, but survives, putting him in a coma. One day, the gang's rape victim visits him in the hospital. She tells him that she has been murdering her rapists one by one, and now she has come for him, revealing that he was by far the most brutal. She then cuts off his penis and stabs him to death. In his final moments, Strang realizes that the only person he has ever really hated is himself, and makes peace with everyone he has wronged and who has wronged him. The novel's other, more stream-of-consciousness narrative, intertwined with the story of Strang's past, takes place in the fantasy world he creates for himself in the coma. At first a bizarre but rousing adventure, it gradually becomes darker as Strang reveals the uglier parts of his life and personality, involving surreal images of brutality and sexual violence. Reception Boyd Tonkin at The Observer praises Welsh for the power of his fiction and writes: "Here was a voice, out of Edinburgh by way of Hades, that would never have a problem with energy, wit or compassion. Finding the right form for all this incendiary talent might prove trickier." Tonkin suggests that Welsh does not know what to do with his fatalism, but that the story "gives a shockingly funny shape to that impasse". Analysis As in many of Welsh's novels, there are many allusions to music and underground youth culture, especially rave culture, punk rock, comic books, and football hooliganism. There is a strong message against violence towards women from men in the book; one passage is in fact set out in a capital "Z", which is the symbol for Zero Tolerance, a women's rights group based in Scotland. The South African narrative is written in a Boys' Own style. The sociopathic Francis Begbie, one of the main characters in Trainspotting, makes a cameo appearance. References External links 1995 British novels Fiction with unreliable narrators Gang rape in fiction Jonathan Cape books Novels by Irvine Welsh Novels set in Edinburgh Trainspotting