James Robertson Books in Order

Robertson's first collection brings together short stories about people caught in close, uneasy encounters. These compact pieces explore relationships, chance and the small pressures that can turn an ordinary moment uncertain.

This short-story collection follows men and women, strangers and lovers, as they test one another's hopes and fears. The stories move through tense encounters where affection, menace and uncertainty are never far apart.

Edited by James Robertson, this anthology gathers 28 contemporary short stories written in Scots, spanning traditional storytelling, rural portraiture, urban brutality, social crisis, and surreal comedy. The regional voices range from Shetland to the Borders, with Irvine Welsh represented by “A Soft Touch.”

A poetry collection by James Robertson, gathering poems that attend to place, memory and the shadows cast by everyday life. It offers an early look at his interest in Scottish landscape, language and history.

James Robertson gathers and retells ghost stories from across Scotland, drawing on folklore, local history and recorded accounts. From famous hauntings to lesser-known tales, the book explores why certain places refuse to lose their ghosts.

This poetry pamphlet takes Alfred Hitchcock's films as its starting point. Through dramatic monologues, sonnets and brief lyrics, Robertson plays with suspense, identity, viewpoint and the strange unease of the cinematic world.

A compact poetry collection built around the sonnet form. Robertson uses the pamphlet's concentrated space to bring close attention to place, language and the telling details of everyday Scottish life.

Working as a ghost on Edinburgh tours, Andrew Carlin becomes absorbed by the grim history of Major Weir. His research opens a second story in seventeenth-century Scotland, where religious zeal, betrayal and violence leave long shadows.

In 1802, a solicitor's agent is sent to find Joseph Knight, once enslaved by Scottish planter Sir John Wedderburn. The search uncovers a life stretching from Jamaica to Scotland, and a legal fight over freedom and power.

Written from Robertson's experience as writer-in-residence at the Scottish Parliament, this book combines sonnets and essays. It considers the new institution, the people around it and the hopes attached to political change.

A rhyming Scots counting book takes children from one to twenty while introducing animals and their traditional Scots names. Warm illustrations and silly sounds make numbers, creatures and language part of the same game.

Gideon Mack is a minister who has no faith in God, ghosts or the Devil, until a fall into a gorge changes everything. His recovered testament mixes memoir, local legend and an unsettling account of meeting Satan.

Six familiar tales, including Cinderella, Snaw White and The Three Wee Pigs, are retold in lively modern Scots. The well-known plots make this a welcoming way to enjoy fairy tales and discover the language.

Katie visits her grandparents' farm and searches for animals hiding around the ferm. This interactive Scots board book combines simple rhymes, bright pictures and a familiar hide-and-seek game for little readers.

A collection of traditional Scots rhymes and songs for babies and toddlers, brought to life with Katie and friendly farm animals. The short, musical pieces invite families to chant, sing and enjoy the sound of Scots together.

Katie searches around the house for her animal friends before bedtime, from the dug and pig to the coo and moose. Lift-the-flap pages and playful Scots language turn the hunt into a gentle game.

This compact edition gathers traditional Scots rhymes for babies and very young children. With Katie, her coo and colorful farmyard scenes, it is made for short shared reading, singing and chanting sessions.

Katie travels through the twelve months, meeting snow, rain, lambs, flowers, beach days and winter celebrations. Rhyming Scots couplets and lively pictures make the changing seasons easy for young children to explore.

As Michael Pendreich sorts photographs taken by his late father, the lives inside them open into a portrait of postwar Scotland. Families, activists, immigrants, politicians and outsiders navigate decades of hope, compromise and change.

These short stories bring private lives and public tensions together, often with Scotland's political arguments close by. Robertson follows characters facing disappointment, loyalty, anger and the stories they build to make sense of events.

Katie is getting ready for a lively party with her family and animal friends. Bright illustrations and simple Scots words make this board book a cheerful read-aloud for very young children.

Twenty-one years after a plane bombing kills his wife and daughter, lecturer Alan Tealing still doubts the official account. New information from a dying American intelligence officer sends him back into a case that has defined his grief.

During 2013, Robertson wrote one story every day, each exactly 365 words long. The resulting collection ranges through myth, folklore, memory, satire, dreams and small observations, offering a fresh story for every day.

This illustrated retelling introduces Robert the Bruce, from his difficult path to the Scottish throne to his struggle against English rule. It presents a key figure in Scottish history in a clear, accessible form for younger readers.

A young owl hates his appearance and asks the peacock to help make him beautiful. This illustrated retelling of a fifteenth-century Scots poem follows the birds' well-meant plan and its cautionary consequences.

Newly single and out of work at fifty, Douglas Findhorn Elder meets Mungo, a talking toad with firm opinions. Their trip from Edinburgh to a remote manor becomes a comic chase involving family secrets, bootleg whisky and second chances.

In Glen Conach, three stories unfold across centuries, linking a Pictish hermit, a nineteenth-century antiquarian and present-day residents. An ancient manuscript and a haunted landscape reveal how memory, myth and loss shape a community.