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The narrative here is centred around the protagonist Alan 'Azzy' Williams, and his life from about age 13 to 22 in The New Team a gang of youths from the estate, and their ongoing battles with rival gang The Young Toi. Like Azzy in The Young Team, Graeme grew up drinking with his pals at an abandoned mansion nicknamed The Crib before later joining their elders in the Young Mavis. The most compelling aspect of this book is explaining the social culture by showing the reader the depth of understanding that Azzy develops as he gets older, and explaining the reasoning behind his actions as he navigates through a life with many challenges. Though obviously influenced from Welsh's Trainspotting, the novel is a literary beast standing on its own two feet. liked the main character growing up through this book and the difficulties of life in modern Scotland.
Graeme Armstrong: ‘When I stopped taking drugs, I felt a kind
The book is written in the vernacular and took me a few pages to get into, but once I did the banter was brilliant. A brutal conflict with their rivals, the Young Toi (YTB) escalates, leaving Azzy firmly at its heart. The former gang member-turned-best-selling author shares his life growing up in a world of drugs, booze and violence – and how he'd "be dead or in prison" by now if he had never read Trainspotting as a teenager. His award-winning documentaries include the BBC One film, Insane Fight Club; the Cinema Eye nominated, Cutting Loose, and Ma Bar, which was nominated for Best Short at the Sundance Film Festival and winner of The BAFTA Scotland Best Short Film Award.
In the housing schemes of adjacent Lanarkshire, Scotland’s former industrial heartland, wee boys become postcode warriors. While it's a part of society that needs to be acknowledged in our stories, I'm not sure I would want to spend anymore time with the characters here.
The Young Team by Graeme Armstrong - Pan Macmillan The Young Team by Graeme Armstrong - Pan Macmillan
Big Kenzie, Eck n Taz appear at the front n somebody shouts, ‘Chill oot fuck, it’s only the younger wans. This love started with Welsh in Edinburgh, moved to McQueer in Glasgow, and was very recently strengthened by Percy in Renfrew. He has overcome his own struggles with drugs, alcohol and violence, and defied expectations to make it to Stirling University where he took a Masters in Creative Writing.The Airdrie-born author has achieved accolades beyond his imagination since launching his Times best-selling debut novel The Young Team last year, which has earned its place on the bookshelves of Martin Compston and Nicola Sturgeon and is now set to be adapted for TV.
The Young Team Novel to Be Adapted By Synchronicity Films The Young Team Novel to Be Adapted By Synchronicity Films
We love to welcome fresh, new voices to Scotland’s literary scene here at BooksfromScotland, and we’re excited to read Graeme Armstrong’s debut novel, The Young Team.Azzy Williams is also a number of other boys growing up in Scotland today, with the first year of high school being the most formative round these parts in deciding your character based solely on who you hang about with. Dialect will inevitably have an effect of the audience width, but this book deserves more acknowledgement. Never read something that describes the west of Scotland so accurately and the situations you can find yourself in if you make the wrong choices. Most lassies caked themselves in the stuff, their necks generally a different colour fae their faces.
Graeme Armstrong on The Young Team, gang - The Skinny Graeme Armstrong on The Young Team, gang - The Skinny
Most people move past the violence and drugs as they leave teenagehood, but some people cling on to it and go down a deep, dark pathway.
The novel follows the life of Azzy Williams from 14 to 21 as he forays into the murky world of gangs, drugs and knife crime in the former industrial heartlands of North Lanarkshire – a story heavily informed by Graeme’s own experiences. I can’t deny the privilege that’s been afforded to me, but I also can’t deny that I’ve gone through similar experiences to Azzy. He recently learned from his pal’s wee brother that his former young team has now rebranded as the ‘238.
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