this curious life

It's been almost 20 years since Irvine Welsh first introduced Rent, Spud and Sick Boy — a group of gritty characters struggling to survive a grim, heroin-fueled existence in late-1980s Edinburgh.

 

'Trainspotting depicted life among a group of guys struggling to survive a grim existence on heroin in late-1980s Edinburgh — which Welsh knew about from his own history of addiction. Those characters also starred in the subsequent Danny Boyle film, and a sequel written by Welsh, called Porno.

 

Now Welsh has tried to fill in the lives of Rent, Spud and Sick Boy before we met them. Skagboys, filled with twists, turns, heroin highs and lows and Scottish vernacular, is a prequel to Trainspotting.'