Do You like book The Busconductor Hines (1992)?
As realism goes, this book is spot on. Kelman's portrayal of Glasgow in the 1980's is accurate. The book is written in 5 chapters, each detailing the unsatisfactory life of Hines who is caught up in a job he feels desperately unhappy in, a struggling marriage and early signs of depression. Whilst Kelman's use of realism sucks the reader into 'place' the novel itself is frustrating in the sense that their is no real plot and nothing really exciting happens. I struggled to finish the book and was disappointed at the end. I can however, commend the author on his realist technique.
—Kirsty Grant
It is possible that even if you combine all of Henry Miller's works they still would not outnumber the times the words "fuck," "fucking," and "cunt" are used in this novel which is not even a sex book. In fact, it has only one extended sex scene,, very tastefully done, no kinkiness whatsoever, the normal sex a couple do after five years of marriage living in a tenement flat without any bedroom with a young son who could wake up at any time while they're humping.So why, asks you, this plethora of seeming obscenities? They're not. They're just part of the normal vocafuckingbulary of bus drivers and bus conductors in Glasgow (the largest city in Scotland). Yes, they love "fuck," "fucking," "cunt" and "shite" (shit) so much that they even insert them in the middle of words for fuck's sake.The couple who had sex, as I mentioned earlier, were Hines and his wife Sandra. If you're paying attention, you'd know by now that they have a young son (around 4 years old if I correctly recall). The title of the book would tell you that Hines is a busconductor (I don't know why, in Glasgow, this is one word--maybe because like Hines, the bus conductor never becomes anything else, say a bus driver, so the word becomes symbolic, the bus tied up with its conductor and vice verza, so: busconductor). The family lives in a dump, as Sandra describes their place, and she wants to live elsewhere. But they have no money to buy a new house somewhere else. Miserable it is, having very little money. But sometimes they're happy, sometimes they make each other laugh and they hug each other. Hh, all ya fenian bastards ye, read it. Ya gonny like it too, like that one by the other Scot, A.L. Kennedy's "Looking for the Possible Dance," naw shite.
—Joselito Honestly and Brilliantly
HIGHLIGHTS: I was blown away by how real The Busconductor Hines felt. The novel’s set in Glasgow, where I’ve lived for 7 years. Kelman brought my city to vivid, brilliant life. It’s been a long time since an author conjured such a realistic believable setting. The Busconductor Hines was steeped in realism. I could almost have been reading a memoir. I think Kelman’s portrayal of the harsh realities of life for British people in the 80’s was spot on. I felt sympathy for Hines and could relate to him. I’ve been stuck in jobs I loathed and forced to watch my dreams and plants melt away to nothing. The Busconductor Hines is written in a sort of stream of consciousness style. There’s no real linear storyline. The novels split into five sections/chapters and each one contains multiple little snapshots and scenes from the life of Hines, his wife Sandra and their son Paul. I think this worked really well. I loved the fact Kelman writes in dialect quite a lot throughout The Busconductor Hines. This added to the sense of realism.LOWLIGHTS: I’m not a prude but still felt like there was a bit too much swearing in The Busconductor Hines. This worked at times but got to be a little OTT and unnecessary. The words cunt, bastard and fuck feature prominently. Kelman may have been trying to create a realistic portrayal of working class people but we don’t curse like troopers. I felt this was a bit heavy-handed.
—Pamela Scott
