Rating: 
Summary: full of holes.
Review: I thought this had a promising premise--a man from an auction house hired to sell the estate of a dead millionaire discovers "snuff" pictures--sounded interesting, albeit familiar to moviegoers who saw "8 mm". And the main character, the auctioneer, was unusual for this kind of novel: a middle-aged gay guy who prowls public parks. But the book was stronger on incident and character than it was on real plot and the twist at the end (I won't reveal it), was full of holes: think about it for a minute and it completely falls apart. And, in the end, the book relied on thematics in order to wrap up, in an unsatisfying way, what should have been wrapped up with good old fashioned storytelling. One final caveat: the book is set mainly in Scotland and the brogue sometimes appeared, at least to this American, to take the form of typos. It was occasionally distracting.
Rating: 
Summary: Am I wrong?
Review: Isn't this the same plot as the Nicolas Cage movie, "8mm"? I began reading this book and was enjoying it, but I'm disappointed in the obvious unoriginality, possible plagiarism? Disabuse me, because I was really liking the book and want to finish it without having that nagging "nah-uh-this-was-already-done" feeling.
Rating: 
Summary: Nicely-done debut.
Review: 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
Rating:
Summary: Crime and Punishment Glasgow Style
Review: Not my usual read, but thoroughly gripping... It's about a Glaswegian auctioneer who gets involved in trying to work out the provenance of some old necrophilic photos he finds in an old mansion. These photos unite unsavoury deeds from the past with present day ills and our protagonist deftly manages his investigation despite (and sometimes thanks to) his own set of vices and dubious acquaintances. Welsh's style is reminiscent of fellow Scot, Iain Banks, but her prose is more poetic with more frequent allusions to literature, beginning chapters with dark little quotes from figures such as Poe and Rimbaud. Once you get into this one, you'll burn through the pages. An intelligent, original novel.
Rating:
Summary: weak plot
Review: There is none of the interesting, arresting writing the NY times book review mentioned present in this book, it reads like an unfinished painting, sorry not to be reommened, highly disappointed!
Rating:
Summary: It's absolutely great, but...
Review: This book is absolutely great. If you want a book with a wonderful writing style, a BRILLIANT central character, and underlying gothic-ism which pervades the whole thing, and a walk on the dark side of Glasgow, then The Cutting Room is definitely or you. It's all quite easy to sum up. Indeed, it is done admirably by one of its own characters: "Rilke here is an auctioneer. He came across some horrible pictures snuff photographs they look like, in some dead guy's attic. Thing is, he also across your card and he wondered if you might be able to tell him something about the man"... That is a very fair summary, actually. It's about Rilke's quest to uncover more information about some suspect photographs and the man who owned them. As a plot, it's quite good, but nothing special. What IS special is Welsh's writing style. However, the plot starts out incredibly promisingly, but evaporates about 100 pages in. the first 100 pages are cracking stuff, but then everything about the photos seems to be forgotten, as our protagonist stumbles around Glasgow having gay sexual encounters and making a general fool of himself. The Rilke's intentions seem all but forgotten until the final 50 pages, which bring the plot back in again, and concludes the book absolutely BRILLIANTLY. I loved the resolution to this book, absolutely loved it. It's brief but very fulfilling. Overall, this is certainly a commendable debut. The writing is of a very high-class indeed, the characters are very good, especially the marvellous Rilke. I enojoyed reading this book a great deal, but it would have been better if the plot wasn't forgotten for half of the time. For that i feel i must deduct a star, but it is a close-run thing. The great writing, grimy atmosphere and wonderful noir and gothic-ness of it are all to be treasured. I'm very much looking forward to her next book.
Rating:
Summary: wait for the paperback
Review: this book is not as good as the reviews have indicated. Yes, it's dark and atmospheric but ultimately it is unconving and dissapointing. I enjoyed the main character and the inside dope on auctions but this book did not add up to much. I was waiting for some harrowing or disturbing ending and what I got was a formula. Marbe next time the author will be able to wed atmosphere, good writing and surprise.
Rating: 
Summary: A surprising good read
Review: This mystery has its wonders; artfully drawn scenes, a plot which holds you to the end, a revealing description of the auction business, a flawed but persistent anti-hero and a
cast characters straight from the demi-monde.
Rating:
Summary: Male herterosexual desire, O the horror if it all!
Review: This novel is narrated by a tough-minded, gay man named Rilke,an appraiser for an auction house which has been comissioned to sell the contents of a house in Glasgow. He uncovers a splendid collection of classic and modern pornography compiled by the man who owned the house, but also a set of half-a-century old photos which seem to depict a woman's torture and murder. He sets out to discover whether or not this "snuff" really occured, and if the owner of that house could really have participated in such an act. On the way, he visits the considerable vice district of Glasgow, with its dirty streets, greasy restaurants, bars, and porn stores. The style is terse and carefully descriptive when necessary. We learn about the increasing trade in women, children and their vital organs, drugs, and porn in Europe since the fall of the USSR, about the compulsions of transvestism and furtive in dark corners (Rilke's own practice), about why camera clubs and their female models are still popular, and about the reasons the auction business is primarily cash-based. The depiction of amoral behavior from one end of the social scale to the other is informative and intelligently noir-ish. But the ultimate reality check Welsh is working toward is problematical, too narrowly conceived, and poorly documented. Various people explain to Rilke that if *men* desire something purely enough, even snuff, they will bring it about. Death is at the heart of sex; Poe is quoted (very inaccurately) about the death of a beautiful women being the most beautiful thing in the world. Since the cavemen (kinky buggers) drew pictures of naked ladies on the walls of caves, "all manner of vice" existed. The distance between between de Sade and the Traveller's Companion books one bought in Paris b/c they were banned in the US and Britain is collapsed. Late in the novel, Welsh has Rilke discover the porn collector's edition of _Merryland_, an 18th century version of the old theme of the woman's body as a newly-discovered paradise. To Welsh (ok, Rilke), the woman is not the subject of adulation and desire, but is anatomized like a dead cadaver, taken apart like a student would cut up a frog. Damned if the other texts are not all about death also: cutting, stripping, murdering the female in the man's heart. Not too far from Jane Campion's version of the novel _The Cutting Room_. And here is Welsh (er, Rilke's) interpretation of a bridal gown: "the bride a sacrifice in white." Point taken, Ms Welsh, time and time again.
Rating:
Summary: A good first book
Review: When its main charismatic protagonist, the disaffected and dissolute Rilke comes upon a hidden collection of disturbing erotic photographs during a house clearance, he feels compelled to unearth more about the deceased owner who coverted them. What results is an edgy, gritty, and, gutsy story that never lets up the drammatic tension. Yes - I absolutely loved the portrayal of Rilke as a flawed but moral person. Welsh has constructed a wonderfully ambivalent ani-hero; someone that I'm sure so many gay men can relate to. This is an elegant, atmospheric and almost gothic book, and I just loved how the author so drammatically brings the underworld streets of Glasgow to life. I'm going to wait anxiously for Welsh's next installment, as this novel definitely deserves a sequel.
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