An acclaimed, award-winning comic novel about truth, lies and storytelling, with an unforgettably unreliable narrator, translated from its innovative Swiss vernacular back into the Glaswegian that was its original inspiration. Known only as ‘the goalie’, the novel’s narrator is always taking the blame. He’s just been released from jail, having kept schtum during a drugs bust. The goalie is a sucker for a good story, he lives and breathes them, is forever telling stories to himself and anyone who’ll listen. He returns to his hometown broke, falling in love with Regi, a barmaid. On a trip together to Spain Regi realises that this obsession with storytelling has its downsides, the goalie all too ready to believe the yarns his so-called friends spin. Naw Much of a Talker is a charming, hilarious tour through the goalie’s anecdotes. Storytelling is his way of avoiding problems and conflict, his crowning achievement and tragic flaw. Regi concludes that it isn’t a woman the goalie needs, but an audience. Inspired by a six month residency in Glasgow, Pedro Lenz harnesses his considerable powers as a performer and oral storyteller in this powerful and unforgettable celebration of the rhythms and musicality of the spoken word. 'Despite the initial strangeness of a Swiss protagonist speaking in the Glaswegian demotic (“afore ah done time in the Joke, ahd this flat fur a while in Aarwengenstrasse”), the rendition works beautifully, capturing both the melancholy and the verbal music of Goalie’s monologue.' The Financial Times 'A welcome change from having the Queens English as the default mode of translation' The Herald 'This is a novel that should be proclaimed, spoken aloud... once you've tuned in you won't switch off... Lenz's book is a verbal spree, a tour de force, its glass perpetually half empty, yet, somehow raised in its final paragraph to toast Goalie's future. A little guy lost, who would be profound.' The Scotland on Sunday '...we were enormously impressed by the extraordinary Naw Much of A Talker where Donal McLaughlin takes Pedro Lenz's crackling 2010 novel in Swiss German and vaults into an excellent written Scots translation.' Ian Campbell, convener of the Saltire Book of the Year Awards 2013 ‘Lenz uses language so brilliantly, it sounds like a live broadcast from real life.’ Der kleine Bund ‘Lenz is a master in creating forms of speech which take in much that remains unspoken.’ Tages-Anzeiger ‘...this story's heart clearly belongs to Glasgow, and Lenz taps into the Glaswegian temprament perfectly... in language that is raw and poignant, and positively glows with humanity.’ The List 'The question of whether we call McLaughlin's language dialect or vernacular will hopefully not interest most of his readers in the slightest, they might well just be hooked on and running through an understated, charming, stoical story.' Goethe's Gonna Getya