• Billy Kay (1993) Scots: The Mither Tongue, Alloway Publishing (ISBN 0-907526) Through his TV and radio work, and this inspirational and radical examination of the history and current state of Scots, few have done more to raise awareness and popularise the cause of the Scots language. Anyone with an interest in Scots should read this book.
• J Derrick McClure (1988) Why Scots Matters, The Saltire Society (ISBN 0-85411-0039-9) A concise and compelling argument, covering much the same ground as Kay.
• J Derrick McClure et al (1980) The Scots Language: Planning for a Modern Usage, Ramsay head Press (ISBN unknown) Not in print. McClure and others suggests how revival might might be acheived, and some of the problems.
• David Murison (1977) The Guid Scots Tongue, The Mercat Press (ISBN unknown) A short, but surprisingly detailed, popular guide by an author who knows his linguistics.
• Charles Jones (1995) A Language Suppressed, John Donald (ISBN 0-85976-427-3). More a linguist's text than the racy title suggests, focusing on Scots pronunciation in the 18th century, but starting with a good review on the pressures on Scots at a key time in its history.

Scottish National Dictionary Association (1991) The Concise Scots Dictionary, Aberdeen University Press (ISBN 0-550-11850-0) One volume Scots to English dictionary covering historical and current usage

Scottish National Dictionary Association (1993) The Concise English-Scots Dictionary, Chambers (ISBN 0-550-11855-1) Quite simply the 'Bible' for modern Scots writers.

Scottish National Dictionary Association (1996) The Scots School Dictionary, Chambers (ISBN 0-550-11856-X) The English-Scots section is likely to set the standard for modern Scots vocabulary and orthography.

Iseabail Macleod (1990) The Scots Thesaurus, Aberdeen University Press (ISBN 0-08-036583-3) Really more a thematic Scots-English dictionary than a thesaurus, so of less use as a tool than you might imagine. The English-Scots index is a useful supplement to CESD, though, with a wider (ie more archaic) coverage of 20,000 words.

• Collins Gem Scots Dictionary (1995) HarperCollins (ISBN 0-00-470486-X) Informative new list of 2000 of the most commonly used distinct Scots words and concepts. Most Lowland Scots might understand most of these words.
• Iseabail Macleod (1986) The Pocket Guide to Scots Words, Richard Drew Publishing (ISBN 0-86267-160-4) Useful booklet 'to help tourists and newcomers' which includes over 500 common Scots words and about the same in Gaelic. Also covers names and place-name elements.
• Michael Munro (1985) The Patter, Glasgow City Libraries (ISBN 0-906169-09-7) Enormously popular and oft-reprinted guide to Glasgow patois. Many of Munro's 'local forms' (about half, I reckon) are basic Scots: ablow, aipple, airieplane, aw, awfy, ayeways, all the way through to wummin, wur, yin, yon, yous, but lots of original Glesga stuff included too. Two other volumes were published, which may indicate something of Glesga inventiveness (especially in terms of abuse).

Beginners will be suprised that after some 70 years of attempted language revival, only now are some half-decent learning materials emerging. A canna unnerstaun it aither.
• Scottish Consultative Council on the Curriculum (1996) The Kist/A'Chiste, Blackie (ISBN 0-17-429007-1) Ground-breaking anthology of Scots (and some Gaelic) materials aimed at primary schools. A teaching pack with cassetes of all the texts is also available (ISBN 0-17-429006-3)
• AUSLQ (1995) Innin Ti the Scots Leid (no ISBN) The Aiberden Univairsitie's Scots Leid Quorum's useful 44 page booklet. Strong on spelling (I use most of their system) and grammar with some useful vocabulary (the human body, clothes, family, the kitchen, time, geography but alas runs out of steam on the phrases and wird leit.
  
• Douglas Kynoch (1994) Teach Yourself Doric, Scottish Cultural Press (with Cassette ISBN 1-898218-17-X) A real oddity this one. Kynoch can't make up his mind whether he's writing an 'entertainment' or a text book (but it does include tests, lists of irregular verbs and so on). And where does Scots fit in? Most of it is pure Scots but unfortunately peculiarities of North Eastern vocabulary and pronunctiation are mixed in without comment so ye hae tae caaa cannie. Popular, though.
• Scots Language Society (1983) GLEG, Scotsoun Publications Aimed mainly at weans, GLEG starts the user off with 200 'wee words' and builds up through stories (of the Mune an the Puddock variety). Good lists of vocab and phrases.
• William Grant and James Main Dixon (1921) Manual of Modern Scots. Not in print. OK, a bit hard to find, but a mine of information if you do. A detailed attempt to descibe a standard 'literary' Scots based on contemporary East Central speech and (mainly) 19th Century literature. The wide range of sources include 'Kailyard' writers (eg Barrie, Crockett, Maclaren), Bell (see below), Burns, Scott and Stevenson as well as local papers and 'reminicsences'. The manual is in 3 parts: Phonetics (70pp), Grammar (120pp) and a Reader (with phonetic transcripts).
• Wilson, James (1915) Lowland Scotch. Not in print Another one you won't find in your local John Menzies but worth hunting down. Meticulous investigation of the speech of the Perthshire village of Dunning (where I used to live!): pronunctiation, grammar, wordlists, sayings, idioms, expressions. Legend has it this was the book that inspired Hugh MacDiarmid to start screivin awa in Scots, and I'm not surprised.