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The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner
The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner
Aug 18, 2025 2:21 AM

Author:James Hogg

The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner

'A Scottish classic, a world classic' Ian Rankin, Observer

Robert is a difficult and disturbed young man. He comes from a troubled family background and turns to his Calvinist faith for solace but finds it hard to get along with other people, particularly his brother and his dissolute father. After he falls in with the mysterious and charming Gil-Martin his actions become more and more extreme. He convinces himself that he is one of the lucky few who have been chosen for heaven and that therefore all his actions automatically right and good...even murder.

WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY LUCY HUGHES-HALLETT

Reviews

A sinister, funny, moving tale of demonic possession, murder and religious fanaticism

—— Sunday Telegraph

Barmy and scary and predating Jekyll and Hyde. And written by a shepherd who barely read any books. A Scottish classic, a world classic, yet hardly anyone, writers excepted, has actually read it

—— Ian Rankin , Observer

A strange and disturbing novel written by a self-educated Highland shepherd. A gripping and pioneering work that deals with the nature of good, evil and religious fanaticism

—— Daily Express

That peerless drama of divided selves and doppelgangers

—— Maggie O’Farrell , Observer

One of the great English gothic novels. Some would say, simply, that it is one of the great novels

—— Daily Mail

An extraordinary, irreducible fantasy

—— Observer

Murray Bail marshals the tensions between his characters and their ideas to great effect

—— Peter Scott , The Telegraph

A gratifyingly dry wit pervades this novel of ideas

—— Chris Ross , The Guardian

Truly gripping

—— Big Issue

Opening with a mysterious yet distressing anecdote about a girl driving dangerously, Peter Ferry's first novel immediately captures the reader's imagination, drawing you into a story filled with humour, tenderness and suspense... The novel is as entertaining as it is intriguing and is not to be missed

—— Aesthetica

A very neat piece of storytelling

—— William Leith , Evening Standard

A neat piece of storytelling

—— Johanna Thomas-Corr , Scotsman

A lovely and heartbreaking book . . . Julia Glass writes the sort of novels you wish would go on forever; such is your immediate attachment to her impeccably drawn characters . . . [she] offers up intimate examinations of the lives on complex people, recognizable for their insecurities and strengths, failings and successes, humor and sadness, loves and loves lost.

—— Miami Herald

An arresting story that is both thorny and complex ... A wonderful novelist will expose truths that elude us in the everyday. [Glass's] eye in I See You Everywhere takes in blind spots and makes them mesmerizing

—— New York Daily News

Julia Glass is a writer firmly in control

—— Dallas Morning News

Glass elegantly captures what it means to be an independent and spirited contemporary woman

—— Chicago Tribune

Beautifully written

—— Image Magazine

It is expertly written in its way, and oddly compelling - like a slushy movie you can't help but respond to

—— Guardian

Moving and thoughtful ... Poignant and compelling, this lyrical novel lifts the veil on an internal world of love, rivalry and misunderstanding; an intricate depiction of sibling relationships

—— Good Book Guide

A beautifully evocative and intelligent novel

—— Woman & Home

This impassioned tale is a gripping read

—— James Smart , The Guardian

Jones is fabulous...offering titbits of danger and discord, yet keeping a cool matter-of-fact tone for the big horrors

—— Sunday Times

Her second novel is a must-read; a devastating, brilliant account of what happens when everything a man believes in...begins to crumble

—— Cath Kidson Magazine

Full of danger and discord

—— Sunday Times Summer Reading
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