Phantom Limb

SHORTLISTED FOR THE SCOTTISH NATIONAL BOOK AWARD

By: Chris Kohler

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Paperback | 11 November 2025

At a Glance

Paperback
400 Pages

Dimensions(cm)
20.1 x 12.9

Paperback

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''Mesmerising... the work of a writer possessed of a rare power and vision''
Daily Telegraph

One evening, Gillis - a young Scottish minister who technically doesn''t believe in god - falls into a hole left by a recently dug up elm tree and discovers an ancient disembodied hand in the soil. He''s about to rebury it when the hand... beckons to him. He spirits it back to his manse and gives it pen and paper, whereupon it begins to doodle scratchy and anarchic visions. Somewhere, in the hand''s deep history, there lies a story of the Scottish reformation, of art and violence, and of its owner long since dead. But for Gillis, there lies only opportunity: to reinvent himself as a prophet, proclaim the hand a miracle and use it for reasons both sacred and profane... to impress his ex-girlfriend, and to lead himself and his country out of inertia and into a dynamic, glorious future.

Industry Reviews

'Captivating... A striking, grand vision' - Buzz Magazine
'With shades of John Byrne and Alasdair Gray, Phantom Limb is to be treasured.A wonderfully strange, full-of-heart debut' - Camilla Grudova, Granta Best of Young British Novelist 2023
'A thrillingly unfettered debut... Phantom Limb is its own kind of miraculous relic: disturbing and mesmerising, the work of a writer possessed of a rare power and vision' - Daily Telegraph
'At once playful and deeply moving, ancient and shockingly new, Phantom Limb is a tremendous read: full of wisdom, madness, kindness and action. You won't read anything quite like it' - Aidan Cottrell-Boyce, author of The End of Nightwork
'I hear a voice, singing in the wilderness - its sound is strange and it is beautiful. Chris Kohler's Phantom Limb is the Scottish novel I have been waiting on for so long' - Alan Warner, author of Nothing Left to Fear From Hell
'Wonderfully farcical and apocalyptic... A novel of considerable charm and energy, summoning a mad world that resembles our own' - Guardian
'Chris Kohler's prose is gorgeous throughout... This excellent debut is well worth the journey' - Literary Review
'Phantom Limb is a chaotic, poignant, grotty, frightening, gleeful cacophony of a book' - Lisa McInerney, author of The Rules of Revelation

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