Young Mungo

Douglas Stuart

Set in early-1990s Glasgow, this literary novel follows fifteen-year-old Mungo Hamilton, a Protestant boy from a chaotic, poverty-stricken household, as he falls in love with James, a Catholic neighbor who keeps racing pigeons. Told in a dual timeline, the book alternates between the tender, dangerous development of their secret romance and a harrowing present-day fishing trip Mungo's mother has sent him on with two near-strangers. It is as much a portrait of toxic masculinity, sectarian violence, and a fractured family as it is a coming-of-age love story.