Malachy Tallack’s Beautiful Atlantic Waltz

Episode Twelve. Recorded at Cupar Library.

This week, I’m revisiting the very first place I ever worked, with one of my very favourite writers…

Malachy Tallack was raised in Shetland, so you might think that we’d meet up there – and I’ll hopefully get there soon enough – but we actually caught up in Cupar Library, what with Malachy living in Fife these days.

I had a Saturday job there when I was at primary school, so it was a lovely, if slightly unsettling, experience going back after more than 35 years, but it hasn’t changed that much at all, and I was just so thrilled about that. We need our libraries more than ever…

Malachy’s latest book, That Beautiful Atlantic Waltz, is a gentle, lilting meditation on landscape, love, home – and loss – that centres on a man called Jack, whose quiet life is upturned by a small and quite surprising thing – and then another – and maybe one more…

It’s also an unhurried love letter to the power of a song, and to country music, and there’s a gorgeous accompanying album from Malachy, via Jack – and both are absolutely worth your time… 

But seeing as That Beautiful Atlantic Waltz is also a reflection on memory, and the myths that tend to wind around it, I started by taking Malachy back to my bygone days in Cupar Library – as far as I remember them…

You can listen on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts – or below! Thanks loads if you listen, subscribe, engage on social media, or get in touch… And you can join Malachy, James Yorkston and me live at Paisley Book Festival on April 26th, 2025 - just click on the live section above, we’d love to see you there!