Darren McGarvey aka Loki grew up in Pollok. He is a writer, performer, columnist and former rapper-in-residence at Police Scotland's Violence Reduction Unit. He has presented eight programmes for BBC Scotland exploring the root causes of anti-social behaviour and social deprivation.
Part memoir, part polemic, this is a savage, wise and witty
tour-de-force. An unflinching account of the realities of systemic
poverty, Poverty Safari lays down challenges to both the
left and right. It is hard to think of a more timely, powerful or
necessary book. -- J.K. Rowling
Nothing less than an intellectual and spiritual rehab manual for
the progressive left. -- Irvine Welsh
Another cry of anger from a working class that feels the pain of a
rotten, failing system. Its value lies in the strength it will add
to the movement for change. -- Ken Loach
Poverty Safari is an important and powerful book. -- Nicola
Sturgeon
Poverty Safari documents in vivid, piercing and frequently
funny prose, the reality of growing up in Pollok and the
consequences of a chaotic family life -- Stephen McGinty * Sunday
Times *
By his own account, Darren McGarvey's first twenty-five years were
a real-life version of Trainspotting . . . Poverty
Safari [is] a painfully honest autobiographical study of
deprivation and how society should deal with it . . . But what has
made McGarvey such a particular figure of attention is his
political message . . . [McGarvey] seems to offer an antidote to
populist anger that transcends left and right . . . his urgently
written, articulate and emotional book is a bracing contribution to
the debate about how to fix our broken politics. * Financial Times
*
Poverty Safari is one of the best accounts of working-class
life I have read. McGarvey is a rarity: a working-class writer who
has fought to make the middle-class world hear what he has to say.
-- Nick Cohen * Guardian *
If The Road to Wigan Pier had been written by a Wigan miner
and not an Etonian rebel, this is what might have been achieved.
McGarvey's book takes you to the heart of what is wrong with the
society free market capitalism has created. -- Paul Mason
The man seems to be on his way to becoming one of the most
compelling and original voices in Scotland's, and maybe Britain's,
public debate. If Scotland's underclass could speak in a single,
articulate, authentic voice to communicate to the rest of us what
it's like to be poor, isolated, brutalised, lost, it would sound
very much like this. * Scottish Daily Mail *
Raw, powerful and challenging. -- Kezia Dugdale
A blistering analysis of the issues facing the voiceless and the
social mechanisms that hobble progress, all wrapped up in an
unput-downable memoir. -- Denise Mina
Describes in unflinching detail the realities of growing up poor in
Britain and sets out to challenge the various ways in which poverty
is represented in the media and on both sides of the political
divide * Guardian *
A raw account of his own deprivation and addiction and a powerful
political argument. * Guardian *
The standout, authentic voice of a generation . . . the world is
looking for eloquent voices like McGarvey's to explain things *
Herald (Scotland) *
Utterly compelling. -- Ian Rankin * New Statesman *
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