You will know Stephen King, of course (Carrie and The Shining??). This is he, the well known "Horror" story author, who has featured the Scottish League club, Buckie Thistle FC, in his latest novel, "If it Bleeds". He could have chosen other Scottish clubs, but he liked the colourful name!
You will notice that King has adorned himself in the club's colours (not Celtic), sent to him by the Scottish club, who were impressed by being part of a "global" literary edition. Life membership for Stephen perhaps next?
Not to spoil your future reading, the book is one of 4 novellas with the recurring character, Holly Gibney. The story involves American youngsters from Pittsburgh, whose school, the Albert Macready Middle School, is threatened with a bomb and they share the horror with the local school in Buckie, through their "pen pal" links.
Inevitably, the American kids, who have the very famous, baseball team, the Pittsburgh Pirates, on their doorstep, start supporting the Moray football club, Buckie Thistle FC, to cement their friendship with their new Scottish friends. The club gets mention in the novel, of course.
Buckie Thistle FC was founded in 1889.
King has donated two signed copies of the book to the club, to raise funds during "Lockdown". Buckie Thistle officials loved the "name check" and club man, Graeme Tallis, sent an email to King telling him about the club and got a reply from the "busy" man.
In return, the club sent King the club colours and King responded with the photograph with the attachment "Buckie for ever". King was promised by the "Jags", with life membership of the club and free entry to Victoria Park, should he ever cross "the pond".
Jamie Watt, who lives in Leyland, Lancashire, bought one of the copies for his daughter an enthusiastic King fan, costing him a few hundred pounds. The other copy is in pride of place in the clubhouse along with the club's 11 Scottish Highland League trophies.
Why the Jags? Partick Thistle are also known as "The Jags", which refers to the Jagged Thistle known as "jaggies" and the Scots also called thistles "thrisses", The badge tells it all.
No comments:
Post a Comment