Booker Prize Winner Douglas Stuart talks Shuggie Bain with Irish author Elaine Feeney

Douglas Stuart was born and raised in Glasgow. After graduating from the Royal College of Art, he moved to New York, where he began a career in design.

Shuggie Bain, his debut novel, won the 2020 Booker Prize and was a finalist for the National Book Award for Fiction, the Kirkus Prize and the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize. His short stories have appeared in the New Yorker and his essay on ‘Gender, Anxiety and Class’ was published by Lit Hub. Shuggie Bain is being published in over 30 territories and a TV adaptation is being made by A24 and Scott Rudin Productions. Loch Awe, the second novel by Douglas Stuart, will be published by Picador in 2022.

“We were bowled over by this first novel, which creates an amazingly intimate, compassionate, gripping portrait of addiction, courage and love.” – The Judges of the Booker Prize

“Shuggie Bain is a novel that aims for the heart and finds it.” – The Times

Elaine Feeney is a writer from Galway. She lectures at The National University of Ireland, Galway and has published three collections of poetry including The Radio was Gospel and Rise. She wrote the award-winning drama piece with the Liz Roche Company, WRoNGHEADED. Feeney’s short story Sojourn was included in The Art of The Glimpse, 100 Irish Short Stories edited by Sinead Gleeson. As You Were (Vintage) – her debut novel was shortlisted for Irish Novel of the Year and featured in various Best of 2020 lists including The Telegraph, Herald (Scotland), Irish Independent, Evening Standard, Guardian, Observer, Sunday Times, Foyles and Irish Times. 

Praise for As You Were 

“Riveting…I was exhilarated reading this” – Roddy Doyle

“The dialogue just crackles, the characters are so alive and real, there’s tragedy here, there’s comedy, there’s everything. It’s a really, really fabulous book” – Donal Ryan

“Funny, visceral, so well observed…I was blown away” – Douglas Stuart, Booker Prize winner