I really loved this short but powerful book.
A look at collective memory, how community history and tragedy can shape its people.
A story about love, family, community and accepting who we are, the people we love and expressing ourselves, in whatever form we need.

Hyped as one of the books to watch out for in 2024, you always reserve just a little trepidation not knowing if the words between the covers will live up too the hype. No need to worry, Pity was perhaps one of the best novels I have read in a very long time. It’s short, the narrative economic, full of meaning, full of characters that will stay long in the mind.
You could say the main character was the Yorkshire mining town McMillan chose as his setting, once bustling, now desolate, depressed like many of its occupants.
Simon, trying to make it as a drag act, his dad, Alex drowning in alcohol and a complex past suppressing his true self. Brian, Alex’s brother reminisces, remembering the town as it used to be, his father one of the many men on their way to the pit day after day. It was these interspersed descriptions of the journey underground, of the heat, the coal dust, black faces that emerged at the end of the day that stood out.
Tragedy ensued, shaped the lives of those connected, its tremors felt all the way to the present.
In short Pity was superb McMillan the poet transitioning with ease to that of novelist.

Set in a Yorkshire pit town, this short debut novel follows 3 generations of a mining family as they wrestle with their identities.

The author is a poet and you can really tell from the beautiful writing. The structure takes a while to get used to, with short passages from each man, plus reports from a group of academics who are doing an art project in the town, as well as parts of the story told through surveillance cameras. Some reviewers felt that this gave a distance to the book, but I didn‘t think so at all; for me, it added perspective.

I thought this was an excellent read , it is a short novel but it certainly gets you thinking. Three generations of men in Barnsley and their lives, we have snippets of the times in the coal pits , living through Thatchers Britain and the destruction of this industry. It’s a book about male sexuality , we meet Simon who is a drag queen at night and also has an OnlyFans account where he makes explicit sex videos. We meet Alex who is Simons dad and has a secret of his own . Ryan works for a surveillance company watching the cameras. Brian is helping academics to understand the history of Barnsley. It’s a very poetic and moving account of the daily activities and the struggles of this town., what it’s like to meet prejudice because of your sexuality and who you are. I particularly liked the sections that go back to describe the mines , so poetic and I could feel the claustrophobia these men must have felt.

Brilliant, bold and extremely beautiful, this book should be read by everyone who has ever felt like an outsider, ever loved someone, ever been caught up in youth and promise. Amazing.

Barnsley is a town that was defined by its pit. Men are men and that's the way it has always been. For Alex it's been a repression of his feelings, for his son Simon it is a dead-end job and the escape of OnlyFriends and a drag persona and for his brother Brian it is the work with researchers about his town. Over time the pit has closed and the town has become less of itself, failing schools, lack of jobs but the people still have their pride.
Having worked in the Barnsley area many years ago I recognised so many of the characters in this book and the circumstances they find themselves in. I love the juxtaposition of the run-down shopping centre, the fact that McDonalds left the town (although there are a couple on the outskirts) and the boutique, Pollyanna. selling high-end designer clothes out of reach of the majority. The theme of the book is change but also about sexuality and it works well on all levels. It's a poetic little gem

Despite being a short novel (less than 200 pages), this was impactful and provocative.

Taking an experimental approach, with different narrative perspectives, styles and typefaces, the reader is exposed to a town (Barnsley) defined by its now defunct coal mines and a tragedy that befell it some years prior.

We get the perspective of three generations of men - grandfather Brian who worked down the mines, his sons Alex and Brian who grew up in the shadow of (though were largely unaware of) the mines but still affected by the fallout of their closure and the accident, and grandson Simon who has a burgeoning career in drag with regular club appearances and a sideline OnlyFans page.

What defines a town and who gets to tell its story? What is community and how does a community move on from tragedy? What impact do traditional male values have on expression of self, sexuality and identity? All of these and more are explored in this interesting and beautifully written little political novel that’s tipped to feature on prize lists. Thought-provoking and memorable. 4/5⭐️

*Many thanks to Canongate books for the arc via Netgalley. As always, this is an honest review.

This was unlike anything I’ve ever read. The descriptions of three generations of men are written and interweaved so beautifully, and it’s the prose that deals with queerness and the older characters that really stood out for me.

Simon’s family has lived in the former mining town of Barnsley for generations. He has a day job in a call centre, but his OnlyFans and drag artist side hustles are his creative outlets. His boyfriend Ryan is a security guard who wants to join the police. His father, Alex, a former miner, struggles to relate to his son. His uncle, Brian, also a former miner, is taking part in a university research project about the town’s history. This is the cast of characters, and identity, community, legacy and continuity are the broad themes of this slim but impactful volume, written with delicacy, subtlety and restraint. Although there is a narrative arc, it’s not perhaps a novel in a conventional sense – maybe more a series of linked vignettes – but Pity is very readable, clover and thought-provoking (and the cover design is absolutely inspired).

Pity examines the concept of masculinity in the ex-coal mine towns left without purpose or direction. Focusing on the father and sons relationship of three generations.
Exploring the hidden aspects of the men's identities, Pity examines how we choose to survive in a world where the rules, expectations and opportunities are changing.

Beautifully crafted and interspersed with a 'documentary' narrative for a contemporary twist.

Short but packed with narrative beauty.

The author of this book is the son of the poet Ian McMillan and is also recognised as an award winning poet in his own right so it isn’t surprising that this can be described as a poetic novel, if not an ode. The object of praise is the Yorkshire town of Barnsley, destroyed by the death of the mining industry and struggling to find some sense of identity, along with the miners who once worked in the pits.

The story revolves around two brothers, Brian and Alex, and Alex’s son, Simon. Alex is trying to come to terms with his homosexuality in middle-age and Simon is trying to make money as a drag artist. The past and the present are elegantly linked with recollections of life in the pit in the 1970s contrasted with Simon’s ‘Margaret Thatcher’ act in the present.

As you might expect from a poet, Andrew McMillan writes extremely well with a sparse, insightful and expressive tone. The interspersed construction of the story is also elegantly done, as is the relationship between Alex and Simon.

It’s a short novel but a rewarding read. It’s anyone’s guess as to how many copies Waterstones will shift in Barnsley but it ought to be more than a few!

Probably an ideal selection for any LGBTQ+ reading groups -- this short novel (only 130 pages, with plenty of white space between paragraphs) blends brevity, lyricism and grit to tell the story of three men across three generations of the same South Yorkshire family, looking at their different relationships to masculinity and sexuality through the lens of their working-class identities.

Stylistically it owes a debt to the novels of Max Porter, and structurally it's an assembled-fragment-novel, the form used so well in 'Assembly' by Natasha Brown and 'No One is Talking About This' by Patricia Lockwood;
which in part seems to have become so popular after the radical stringency of Annie Ernaux's memoirs. McMillan isn't quite on the same level as these novels, his writing not always as precise or impactful, and his tone of voice a little more limited, but he manages his time periods and sense of characters well.

For queer readers there's much to enjoy here in how McMillan writes about drag, not with Wilde-ish aestheticism, but with grit and discomfort - a sort of Ken Loach dirty realism - making it feel relatable and inhabited, and making clear parallels to the 'drag act' of masculinity.

While I would have liked a little more variation in the style, which at times feels constricted and slightly repetitive in the moods it evokes and the way it portrays the characters, this is still an involving, quick read that will have an impact and give readers something to debate, both in terms of its writing and its subject matter.

Beautiful story wonderfully written and compelling in its use of language. Three generations in a working-class mining town and meditations from within and without the community make this a very compelling read.

Though a short novel, Pity is magnificently profound and a triumph of story-telling art. Even with its complex structure and multiple narratives, it ultimately manages to provide emotional fulfilment to its reader.

Narrated through short snippets or vignettes, this concise 100-page novel centres on a drag queen from Barnsley who embodies the persona of Margaret Thatcher.

Themes of queer guilt, identity, mining disasters, and drag as both an art form and a form of protest or commentary intersect throughout the narrative. In a society where effigies of Thatcher were burned upon her death, the novel prompts readers to contemplate the implications of dressing up as her. Does it show respect for those who suffered under her policies, or does it glamorize or trivialize her impact? The protagonist, Simon, or Putanna as she is known in drag, straddles the intersection of being gay and hailing from a mining family, adding layers of complexity to the exploration of these themes.

This is a first for me by the author and one I enjoyed and I would read more of their work. The book cover is eye-catching and appealing and would spark my interest if in a bookshop. Thank you to the author, publisher and Netgalley for this ARC.

I was initially interested in 'Pity' due to its subject - former mining towns (with it being the 40th anniversary of the Miner's Strike) and sexuality. It was even better than expected. It took me a second to get used to the structure of this book, but once I had it was fantastic; offering us short yet powerful glimpses into the lives of Alex, Ryan, Brian, Simon, and others. Beautifully and poetically written

This book is short, less than 200 pages, but there is not a word wasted. Highly recommend.

Having lived in South Yorkshire for the last 40 years I'm very aware of the different narratives around mines/miners and the impact of the strikes and the Thatcher government Refreshingly, , this short novel gave perspective from areas I was less familiar with, particularly a more contemporary view through the eyes of a young gay man reflecting his life and that of his father.
I did find the 3 viewpoints and rather disjointed style quite difficult however, particularly the academics who I personally just found irritating but maybe that was the point.
Seen as a whole though I found this a really interesting and moving read
Thank you to netgalley and Canongate for an advance copy of this book.

A short but luscious book following three generations in the North of England. As a queer person from the North, this book was perfect. The connections the multitude of perspectives had to the town were well-developed and thoughtful. The drag and mining community are thrust into the spotlight, an aspect of the novella which I thoroughly enjoyed reading. That said, I would have preferred slightly more pages in order to fulfil the ambition that this work has.

I'm from Yorkshire who grew up during the miners strike. I am a daugther of a miner, a sister of a miner, a niece and a cousin of miners (Ex miners that is).

I was part of this world that the author writes about and expected to be emotionally invested in this story.

It is beautifully written and evocative, the pages scattered with sentences that make you stop and think. So many parts pulled me back to my childhood, the sense of place portrayed well.

But overall it felt distant and disjointed to me. For something that should have felt deeply personal, I unfortunately didn't connect with.

A town that was once a thriving mining community is now neglected with little prospect of any improvement visible. Told through three generations of the same family, a grandfather who was a miner, his sons who had to cope with his death in a mining incident and his grandson, Simon, who uses Margaret Thatcher as part of his drag act and whilst not having any personal recollection of the strikes, knew the affect that the Tory government had on the town. The town that at times seemed to be ridiculed by outsiders such as football pundits when the local team played top six teams.
I found the account of the miner, Brian, the most fascinating. Very short and more or less identical they showed how mundane life was, day in and day out. People leaving their homes to go down the pit. It was always the last part of these that I found slightly intimidating because they showed the danger faced daily. My family were miners in South Yorkshire and I could imagine them feeling exactly the same way.
I enjoyed Pity even though it wasn’t quite liked I expected it to be.