Welsh chooses to write prequel

CHOOSE school, choose puberty, choose the path to heroin addiction!

Fifteen years after the smash-hit novel, we will shortly discover what sent a group of Scottish youngsters Trainspotting.

The anticipation is already building after author Irvine Welsh confirmed he was in the process of writing a prequel to the cult novel.

Trainspotting was made into a film in 1996 and became one of the most defining and harrowing snapshots of the drug culture at the end of the 20th century.

It launched the career of actor Ewan McGregor and its iconic poster — the reprinted text of the Choose Life monologue — adorned the walls of college students across the country.

Now Dublin-resident Welsh is ready to write the final instalment in the trilogy, returning to the streets of 1980s Edinburgh to show where it all went wrong for the main characters, Renton and Sick Boy.

“It is basically a prequel and will be about how Renton and Sick Boy went from being daft young guys just out for the buzz to total junkies,” said Welsh.

“It focuses on them when they are a couple of years younger and shows how their attitudes and behaviour start to change as they become more defined by the drug and the culture around it.”

The so-far untitled short novel is due to be published next year. Welsh said the idea emerged after he discovered old notes from the first novel.

“I had a great deal of material that, for various reasons, wasn’t suitable for the book.

“I found the material looking through boxes that have been in the attic for years, I thought I had slung them out ages ago. I am enjoying it — it is like running into old pals again,” he said.

Scottish-born Welsh wrote the initial script while working in the housing department in Edinburgh, having witnessed the underbelly of the city’s drug scene at a younger age.

In 2002, Welsh published Porno, a sequel to Trainspotting and focused on its two main characters’ efforts to succeed in the pornography industry.

He has another novel, Crime, which is due to be published in July.