Damian Barr

SHORTLISTED FOR THE NERO BOOK AWARD FOR FICTION 2025 SHORTLISTED FOR THE EDWARD STANFORD TRAVEL WRITING AWARD FOR FICTION 2026 SHORTLISTED FOR THE WINSTON GRAHAM PRIZE FOR HISTORICAL FICTION 2026 LONGLISTED FOR THE WALTER SCOTT PRIZE FOR HISTORICAL FICTION 2026 A BBC RADIO 2 BOOK CLUB PICK A BEST FICTION BOOK OF 2025 FOR THE GUARDIAN, THE OBSERVER, THE HERALD AND THE BBC 'Crackles with creative rebellion' DOUGLAS STUART 'immensely sensual' ELIF SHAFAK 'A novel that brims over with generosity and warmth' OBSERVER He will stay like this forever, Robert's arm draped round him. They will be forever twenty. Scotland, 1933. Bobby MacBryde is off to the Glasgow School of Art, to his future. On his first day he will meet another Robert, a quiet man with loose dark curls - and never leave his side. With the world on the brink of war, their unrivalled talent takes them all over Europe, partying, loving, fighting, painting. In Soho, they become stars as the bombs fall. Based on a true story, The Two Roberts is a stunningly imagined tale of devotion and obsession, art and class. It's a love letter to two almost-forgotten artists who fought to change the way the world sees - and paid a devastating price.

A BEST FICTION BOOK OF 2025 FOR THE GUARDIAN, THE OBSERVER, THE HERALD AND THE BBC 'Crackles with creative rebellion' DOUGLAS STUART'We need love stories like these. Utterly absorbing' JACKIE KAY'Vivid and alive. A truly great story penned by one of Scotland's finest writers' JENNI FAGAN'A novel that brims over with generosity and warmth' OBSERVERHe will stay like this forever, Robert's arm draped round him. They will be forever twenty. Scotland, 1933. Bobby MacBryde is on his way. After years grafting at Lees Boot Factory, he's off to the Glasgow School of Art, to his future. On his first day he will meet another Robert, a quiet man with loose dark curls - and never leave his side. Together they will spend every penny and every minute devouring Glasgow - its botanical gardens, the Barras market, a whole hidden city - all the while loving each other behind closed doors. With the world on the brink of war, their unrivalled talent will take them to Paris, Rome, London. They will become stars as the bombs fall, hosting wild parties with the likes of Lucian Freud, Francis Bacon and Elizabeth Smart. But the brightest stars burn fastest. Stunningly reimagined, The Two Roberts is a profoundly moving story of devotion and obsession, art and class. It is a love letter to MacBryde and Colquhoun, the almost-forgotten artists who tried to change the way the world sees - and paid a devastating price.

Brighton, 2008: Damian Barr celebrates getting a deal to write a memoir about his chaotic childhood in 1980s Lanarkshire. But as soon as he opens the door to his troubled past, everybody comes rushing through, including his younger self and the woman who forever changes his family, community and country: Maggie Thatcher. Soon, revisiting his past turns into reliving it - the fear and the joy. From the furnaces of the Ravenscraig Steelworks to the sanctuary of Carfin Grotto, there's trauma and triumph, coming of age and coming out. Can Damian survive his past again, and his voice and finally tell his story? Past and present collide, endangering the future, in this stage adaptation of the modern Scottish classic and Sunday Times Memoir of the Year.

A unique, tender and witty memoir of surviving the tough streets of small town Scotland during the Margaret Thatcher years________________________'Shocking and funny in equal measure, and will have you weeping with laughter and sorrow' Independent on Sunday'A work of stealthy genius' Maggie O'Farrell'Certain memoirs catch a moment and seem to define it, bottle it ... hugely entertaining' Sunday TimesIt's 12 October 1984. An IRA bomb blows apart the Grand Hotel in Brighton. Miraculously, Margaret Thatcher survives. In small-town Scotland, eight-year-old Damian Barr watches in horror as his mum rips her wedding ring off and packs their bags. He knows he, too, must survive. Damian, his sister and his Catholic mum move in with her sinister new boyfriend while his Protestant dad shacks up with the glamorous Mary the Canary. Divided by sectarian suspicion, the community is held together by the sprawling Ravenscraig Steelworks. But darkness threatens as Maggie takes hold: she snatches school milk, smashes the unions and makes greed good. Following Maggie's advice, Damian works hard and plans his escape. He discovers that stories can save your life and - in spite of violence, strikes, AIDS and Clause 28 - manages to fall in love dancing to Madonna in Glasgow's only gay club. Maggie & Me is a touching and darkly witty memoir about surviving Thatcher's Britain; a story of growing up gay in a straight world and coming out the other side in spite of, and maybe because of, the iron lady. Damian Barr's critically acclaimed debut novel, YOU WILL BE SAFE HERE, also available now.