Imelda
by John Herdman
"Imelda, Imelda, are you truly gone from us, beautiful bright angel? In what Elysian fields do you now walk? For you have I scaled the heights of folly, descended into the abyss of madness and self-alienation, struggled in the maelstrom of despair ..."
John Herdman's masterpiece of the modern Scottish Gothic appears in e-book and audio book with a new introduction from the author. Black humour and even blacker lives collide in a tale of love and murder on an old Scottish Borders family estate. In a grotesque story told from two consummately contrasting angles we find the arrogant genius, Frank, known as 'Superbo', and his hated, ponderous brother Hubert.
Raw and immoral, Imelda is a subtle puzzle, mocking the reader in its quest for answers. Murder and madness this way lie―but who if anyone is to be believed in unpicking the deadly secrets behind the birth of cousin Imelda's child?
An assured masterpiece from Scotland's greatest living chronicler of the dark side, Imelda, first published in 1993 became an instant classic of Scottish letters.
Scottish publisher invites us to rediscover the brilliance of John Herdmanhttps://t.co/3LwGFn1kIh @leamingtonbooks
— Scotsman Arts (@scotsman_arts) July 18, 2020
John Herdman Interview on OUT OF COVER:
REVIEWS
"Imelda reads like a substantial work of fiction .... a disturbing, grotesquely comic and compelling tale ... irresistible in its intensity ... Imelda is an engaging and arresting psychological study, and it shows Herdman at his very best."
"Imelda establishes itself from the start as a gripping, substantial tale."
"..... master of a unique, dry, grotesquely humorous voice .... Imelda is the centrepiece .... a masterly mingling of the petty and the paranoid, the pathetic and the boastful, the credible and the incredible .... Herdman deserves to be much more widely known; this subtle, assured little masterpiece should go a long way to establishing him among our foremost novelists."
".... this dark, tragic story .... Imelda is nightmarish in both its subject and means of narration - and yet is completely and utterly compelling."
"Herdman continues a tradition of Scottish surrealism which has been around since Hogg and Galt."
"Herdman's writing is a feat of great wit and invention."