Product Description

When Rilke, a dissolute and promiscuous auctioneer, comes upon a hidden collection of seemingly violent photographs, he feels compelled to unearth more about the deceased owner who coveted them. What follows is a compulsive journey of discovery, decadence, and deviousness that leads Rilke into a dark underworld of transvestite clubs, seedy bars, and porn shops. In this hidden city haunted by a host of vividly drawn characters, Rilke comes face to face with the dark desires and illicit urges that lurk behind even the most respectable facades.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #718642 in Books
• Published on: 2003-11-25
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 304 pages

From Publishers Weekly
Yet another talented Scottish author makes a debut with this dark and twisty thriller, boasting a highly unusual hero and a compelling background that shows extensive inside knowledge. The protagonist ("hero" is not quite the word) is Rilke, a promiscuously gay auction dealer working for a struggling Glasgow firm. On an appraisal call one day at the house of Roddy McKindless, a wealthy and recently deceased citizen, he comes across an extensive library of pornography, which includes pictures suggesting a "snuff"-the slaughter of a woman for sexual purposes. Rilke finds himself, to his surprise, engaged in trying to find out who the girl in the picture was, and whether she was really killed. Using his seamy contacts in the city-a pornographer, a girl who poses nude for eager "cameramen," a shady bookseller-he sets out on his peculiar odyssey, pausing from time to time for a quick and wordless sexual encounter, and becoming engaged along the way in a plot with the glamorous and world-weary Rose, who runs his auction house, to abscond with the proceeds of a highly profitable sale. Rilke is hardly a likable character, but as Welsh presents him, he is so witty, self-aware and oddly vulnerable to the occasional decent instinct that he becomes disarming. The Glasgow color is expertly applied; Welsh obviously knows her auction business, and also how to keep an intriguing story moving. She is not good at action, however, and the actual climax, in which the mystery of McKindless's death is solved, is oddly muted and unconvincing. This is one of those books, however, in which the journey is infinitely more beguiling than the destination.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
First-novelist Welsh offers a fresh voice and an arresting plot in this darkly atmospheric portrait of Glasgow's mean streets. Gay auctioneer Rilke agrees to pack up and sell off an enormous quantity of high-quality goods in an inordinately short amount of time, no questions asked. He is a bit blinded by the huge amount of cash and fails to inquire why there's such a rush, an oversight he will soon pay for. While clearing out the attic, he discovers a horrifying packet of snuff pornography. Despite his own proclivities for promiscuous, anonymous sex, he is haunted by the woman portrayed in the photographs and determines to discover whether the events depicted actually happened. His drug-dealing transvestite friend, Les, puts him into contact with an underground pornography ring, and soon Rilke learns more than he wants to about the seamy trade. Welsh offers an immensely appealing cast of characters, from the irreverent yet softhearted Rilke to his business partner, the indefatigable Rose. And Welsh's Glasgow is a desperado's paradise, filled with sodden pubs and seedy sex clubs. Joanne Wilkinson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review
"Welsh's writing style is reminiscent of early, perverse lan McEwan."

Customer Reviews

Not the same old story.
This is a very inventive and gritty mystery with a very likable and unique narrator and supporting cast. Plus, the hero's business, auctioning off antiques, makes for an engrossing setup. While scouting the house of a wealthy elderly woman, our protaganist finds some very intriguing photos. Her request is that he destroy all that he finds in her deceased brother's private room. He doesn't.
I read a lot of mysteries. And I truly appreciate one that has complex characters and tells a good story. One that you haven't read several times before.
This is a good read. It's offbeat and not for the squeamish. The details can be disturbing and there is sexual content some might find offensive.
I didn't.

Well Written & Engaging
I am not a big fan of mystery novels, but I picked this gem up in a used bookstore based on the jacket raves. Once started, I could not put it down. Most of this has to do with the wonderful writing, much like a Joyce Carol Oates novel - I was mesmerized by the flow and choice of words, the character development and then finally the story. You can feel the dark, charged atmospheres in all scenes. The emotions described are raw and genuine. Parts of the book are even amusing. Usually I am bogged down by dialogue accents from other countries; in this case I was merely charmed. I was captivated by the main character Rilke, though to be sure - he and parts of the story line are seedy and gritty. If that's not your cup of tea, duck out now. I don't care that the plot is simple, I was drawn in to all of it as I read it over several rainy nights when I should have been sleeping. Each chapter seduced me to want more. While Rilke could have been heartless and cold, he came across as vulnerable and real - I prefer to see the personal side of some charcters and his isn't the only one we witness. I give four stars only because I know some people will judge the book none-too-quickly simply on the r-rated aspects of it - to each his own. I, like other reviewers here, cannot believe this account came from a woman. Whoever the author is, I would like them to write more. This would make a terrific little movie.

Nicely-done debut.
Louise Welsh, The Cutting Room (Canongate, 2002)

This is one of those books where the reader who isn't an insider is going to enjoy it, but the person who knows is going to get far more out of it. Another in the seemingly endless list of British mystery authors turning out stunning debut novels is Louise Welsh, who introduces us to homosexual auctioneer Rilke (no first name, at least not that I caught), whose auction house is offered a job clearing out the estate of a dead man, with one caveat: the person offering the job (the man's sister) wants the contents of the attic destroyed. He must agree not to sell them, not to keep the, but to burn them. Rilke discovers, in the attic, among other things, a series of pictures that look as if they are of the torture and murder of a woman almost half a century ago, and he sets out to track down the identity of the woman in the pictures, stirring up a hornets' nest on both sides of the law while doing so.

The mystery itself is a good thing, but you can read any superlatives I have to say about it in my reviews of the debut novels by Mark Billingham, China Mieville, Erin Hart, or a score of others I've penned over the past year. Welsh goes one further, adding slices of Rilke's sexual exploits into the mystery that are so realistic I wondered off and on throughout the novel whether "Louise Welsh" is actually a pseudonym for a gay man, and the picture on the back jacket is the wife of the guy Stephen King used for Richard Bachmann's back cover picture. The emotional tugging of loneliness while resisting the cruising spots just down the road, the nervous ecstasy of hurried sex in a public place, even the odd, paradoxical thrill of the roundup, all are handled with such stark realism, and the flavors herein are so germane to the cruising culture, that if Louise Welsh really is Louise Welsh (and not Louis), she possesses an amazing talent for assimilating character depth that portends a fantastic career ahead.

You want to read this one, but it might turn your stomach. You have been warned. *** ½