I shall say here and now that all subjectivity is flying out of the window because I am a fully paid up, card-carrying, flag-waving Grayophile. He suggests in the last chapter of this book, albeit through the fictional voice of his most ferocious critic, that this will be his last novel. After all, as he says, he is "72, and in poor health".

But like so much in Gray's work, can we really believe what we read? Fact interweaves with fiction at every turn, real names are used in unreal situations. If I can say nothing else about Alasdair Gray's fiction, it is that it certainly creates its own alternative world. I hope it's not his last book, but I shall have to prepare myself for the worst anyway. :(

This isn't a straightforward narrative. It never really is with Gray. This is a collection of the last papers of John Tunnock, a retired Glasgow school teacher who has lived in the Hillhead area with his two aunts all his life, until their deaths. Free of having to care for or answer to them, Tunnock starts picking up "young things" and bringing them back to his old-fashioned home. Meanwhile, he is trying desperately to write his magnum opus of a historical novel, and the bulk of Old Men in Love is made up of the fragments of his work so far: first in ancient Greece, then Renaissance Italy, then Victorian England. In all of the fragments there are old men in love. Socrates in love with knowledge and goodness and (arguably) beautiful young men; Fra Filippo Lippi in love with art and an ex-nun; Henry Prince in love with God and with himself. Tunnock is not really in love with anyone - he just flits from one appallingly inappropriate sexual encounter to the next, all the while gradually showing that he is quite the misogynist (a reaction against the strong women he was surrounded by during his upbringing, perhaps?). Or at least, that's my interpretation. Mixed in with this is Tunnock's (Gray's?) vision for a socialist, independent Scotland. Maybe it's that vision that Tunnock is truly in love with.

As ever, Gray has illustrated his work throughout, and it is as stunning as ever. My favourite illustration is an intricate line drawing of Hillhead, in the West End of Glasgow, where Gray and Tunnock live, and where I used to live. There is a surprising amount of joy to be had in being able to pick out what used to be your bedroom window in a drawing like that.

Old Men in Love will not be for everyone, but it is for me, and barring a miracle I can say with all confidence that this book is my read of 2007. ( )