A chance to be in Irvine Welsh's prequel to Trainspotting

Published on Tuesday 31 August 2010 19:04

BEST-selling author Irvine Welsh is hosting a special screening of the film version of his famous first novel tonight to help raise funds for a Scottish charity.

The showing of Trainspotting is at the Dominion Cinema in Edinburgh in aid of charity Scottish Love in Action (SLA). The audience will also have the opportunity to pose questions to the Edinburgh-born author as well as the chance to be named in his new book, Skagboys, the prequel to Trainspotting which will be released in April 2012.

Speaking about his new book, Mr Welsh said: "I'm limited to an extent because I have to use the same characters that were in Trainspotting.

"I get my names from the Edinburgh phonebook anyway so it makes no difference to me what they are actually called.

"People will know what kind of characters their name is going to be used for. It's good to be able to help the charity in this way too."

The movie starred Ewan McGregor, Ewen Bremner and Jonny Lee Miller but Mr Welsh is not focusing on another stint on the big screen while writing his new novel.

SLA provides funding to a grass roots non-governmental organisation which runs projects in the south-east Indian state of Andra Pradesh.

The organisation cares for nearly 600 once destitute children in Homes-cum-Schools.

Mr Welsh said: "I've been a frequent visitor to India, poverty is obviously a huge issue. SLA is a small Scottish charity working in India which I thought was quite unusual."

Scots nurse Gillie Davidson, who set up SLA, said: "Many of the children we care for have only managed to survive by scavenging in rubbish tips, or living on the streets where they are open to being trafficked into prostitution or forced labour.

"We give these children a chance in life. The children are amazing and they have such a zest for learning

"Irvine Welsh has been fantastic. He's just such a lovely guy. He really cares about the underdog.