Caledonia Dreamin'

Glaikit, mockit, droukit, drouthy, couthy, scunner, thrawn – the Scots language is rich with words too gallus not to glory in, dialect terms that deserve better than to be boxed away as precious oddities. For us, those words aren't quaint parochialisms of a past preserved in amber; they're wild wee beauties, straight razors slashing keen to the quick of meaning. So we sent out a solicitation for stories that wielded such words as weapons for today, for tomorrow. We asked writers from around the world to pick up one of these words and flick it open to gleam in the light of the 21st century. To play with it, work with it, give us a story that riffed on it with relish – the sound, the sense. Run wild with it, we said, ye ramstouger rannigants.

The result? Seventeen tales from writers Scottish or not-so-Scottish, with not a hint of tea-towel twee in there. No Shaggy Kelpie Stories here; this is strange fiction as it's meant to be: testing the boundaries; pushing the envelope. From Neil Williamson's riff on "wersh" to Anna Tambour's exploration of "boak," I think you'll be impressed; I know I was.

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Table of Contents

Sweeter Than, Neil Williamson

Maw, Wendy Muzlanova

Maukit, Brian Milton

Fallen through a Giant’s Eyes, T.J. Berg

Newayr, Douglas Thompson

The Bouk Puppie Show, Preston Grassman

The Laird of Nagasaki, Tom Bradley

Palais 1930, Rob McClure Smith

The Losers, Angus McAllister

Drive the Warlike Angles into the Sea!!!, Nick Mamatas

Widows in the World, Gavin Grant

I am not (), Phil Raines

Studying Honeybloods With the Queen of Exotica, Kirsty Logan

Mary, Thomas and Joe, Stravaigin, David McGroarty

For Your Guising, Gio Clairval

Nae Greeance o’ Bane, Tim Jarvis

Bowfin Island, Anna Tambour