Quite Ugly One Morning

Christopher Brookmyre's debut novel - a tale of greed, corruption, blood, deception and whatever that awful smell is.

Jack Parlabane is a Glaswegian journalist, returning from LA to Edinburgh after narrowly escaping an attempt on his life. Finding himself locked out with the hangover from hell, he heads for the flat below, hoping to climb up through their window. Instead he discovers what could be the biggest case of his career, not to mention the weirdest.

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Tropes used in Quite Ugly One Morning include:

• British Newspapers: Jack takes a very dim view of the brand of sensationalised journalism produced by Edinburgh's fictional Evening Capital a sort of middle ground between The Daily Mail and The Daily Express.
• Dr. Jerk: It's implied that Jeremy was one of these, since Sarah said he seemed to lack real empathy for patients' suffering.
• Everyone Can See It: Jack and Sarah.
• Heroes Want Redheads: Sarah. Would be a case of Even the Girls Want Her to but mooted since Jenny already swings that way.
• Magnificent Bastard: Stephen Lime's opinion of himself, minus the the "Bastard" part.
• MD Envy: Sarah is an anaesthetist, and has several rants in the book about arrogant surgeons, and people who are surprised to learn that one needs to be a doctor to practice anaesthesia.
  • Arrogant, but more often bloody slow, surgeons often get a lot of stick off them. Especially the ones who are daft enough to think that the gas man's only job is to make the patient stay still.