IRVINE WELSH has revealed his latest thriller, set in Las Vegas, is being adapted for TV even before it has been published.
The Trainspotting author, 67, will release his new novel “Can Nothing Save Us?” on 13 August.
But the book, described as a pulsating thriller that “mines the hedonism and paranoia of Las Vegas”, has already gone into development for the small screen in the US.
Welsh said: “It comes out in August and it’s actually been bought as a TV series in America.
“It’s gone into development now, which is quite unusual to get something happen so quick.”
The novel is about a divided family forced to confront the past and reckon with a dangerous future, with previews revealing “a drug-fuelled club promoter drags his wealthy family into a nightmare of suspicious neighbours, charismatic cult leaders and more”.
Welsh said: “It’s about a family living in Las Vegas – not the Strip and downtown Las Vegas but a bit outside in a place called Summerlin, which was one of Howard Hughes’ planned communities.
“It’s about a family… all very different in their world views and they’re all thrown together when this catastrophe takes place.
“It’s basically about my view of what America is like now.”
Welsh shot to fame in 1993 following the release of his debut novel Trainspotting, and has gone on to sell over 6 million books worldwide.
While many of his novels have been set in the world of Trainspotting, featuring his home city of Edinburgh and a cast of iconic characters, Welsh insists he also enjoys exploring other less familiar settings.
The author, who recently spoke to an audience at his childhood library in Muirhouse as part of the Edinburgh International Book Festival’s Paper Trails project, added: “I think it’s great to stay in your lane and do the things you like to do. It’s also great to move out, so I’m always trying to find the balance.
“I like to move out, a bit like what I’ve been doing in life, jumping in and jumping back out.”
And he said he encouraged those adapting his novels for the screen never to be “a slave to the book”.
He added: “With ‘Can Nothing Save Us?’ they’ve just sent me the (pitch) deck, and they’ve really gone out there.
“They’ve done it for the American TV markets. They’v’e really glossed up and sexed up and all that sort of stuff.
“And I think ‘great’. I don’t want to read the same stuff that I’ve already read. I want to see something a little bit different, a little bit transformative, as long as it basically captures the spirit in the storyline and the characterters.
“You have to realise that adaptations have to work in that medium, it has to work as a TV show or a film… It has to transform.”
