Books
Edinburgh will host eleven busy festivals in 2018
Everyone knows that Edinburgh is the home of Scottish festivals. But did you know that during the year, there are 11 different festivals taking place? Festivals Edinburgh work with Edinburgh’s 11 major year-round festivals which offer some of the most exciting experiences in global entertainment, debate, visual and performing arts. Edinburgh’s medieval closes and Georgian…
Read MoreBook review – Loch Maree’s Missing Sea Trout
What’s the story? Jaffa has long maintained that salmon farms are not to blame for the decline of wild salmon and sea trout stocks in rivers on Scotland’s west coast, and this book sets out to prove his point. By focusing on Loch Maree at the time of a so called collapse in the 1980s,…
Read MoreHonest Alastair returns a ‘lost’ library book to Stornoway
Most of us have encountered a fine when borrowing books from our local libraries and returning them late. But the honesty of Alastair McIntosh has to be commended. When the Alastair ordered a second hand book on eBay recently, he was thrilled to get a first edition with the dust cover still intact. However, he…
Read MoreBook review – The Day She Saved the Doctor
What’s the story? To mark International Womens Day 2018, BBC Books have released Doctor Who – The Day She Saved The Doctor. Containing a quartet of short stories, these have been written by four women – two of whom, Jenny T Colgan and Susan Calman, are Scots – with a female cover artist, it’s very…
Read MoreScots of note added to UK’s historical biography
Prominent Scots are among 216 contemporary individuals who have been added to the new edition of the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (DNB). The latest update of the DNB has been published, and gathers biographies from stand out men and women who transformed the UK in one way or another. The online edition of the…
Read MoreMusical compositions in one new volume
A major collection of James Scott Skinner’s musical compositions has been compiled by fiddler Alastair Hardie. The author of The Caledonian Companion has collected 33 famous tunes for violin, arranged in sets, composed or played by The Strathspey King, James Scott Skinner (1843-1927) as he performed in Scotland, England and America and also found in…
Read MoreBook review – A Wild Call by Martyn Murray
What’s the story? The non-fiction book follows Martyn Murray on a voyage through the Scottish Isles after his father’s death and a hunger for the feeling of freedom over takes him. Wishing to re live the trips he once took with his father, Murray falls in love with an old ketch is Ireland and restores…
Read MoreDame Judi Dench to headline Boswell Book Festival
Dame Judi Dench will headline Scotland’s biography and memoir festival. Running at Dumfries House, in East Ayrshire, the eighth Boswell Book Festival will host a series of events, running from 4-6 May, in the world’s only literary festival marking memoir and biography. It is named after James Boswell, whose family had settled in Auchinleck since…
Read MoreAn alternative take on Mary Queen of Scots
Book review: Mary Queen of Scots – A Study in Failure By Jenny Wormald What’s the story? Mary Queen of Scots is a highly detailed and occasionally damning account of the life of one of Scotland’s most famed monarchs. No stone is left unturned and no mistake of Mary’s left unpunished as Wormald truly immerses the…
Read MoreWhen business boomed for the Archangels
Book review: The Archangels Share By Kenny Kemp, Graham Lironi and Peter Shakeshaft What’s the story? The book tells the tale of Archangels, a business angel syndicate founded in Edinburgh in 1992 by Barry Sealey and Mike Rutterford. It follows their story of leading the way in terms of investing in new promising businesses and…
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