Francis Plug is a troubled and often drunk misfit who causes chaos and confusion wherever he goes - and where he most likes to go is to real author events, collecting signatures from the likes of Salman Rushdie, Kazuo Ishiguro, and Eleanor Catton. As he adds to this collection of signed Booker first editions, Francis - a wannabe author himself - is also helpfully writing a self-help manual. Devised with the novice writer in mind, it is full of sage wisdom and useful tidbits to help ease freshly published novelists into the demands and rigors of author events, readings and general life in the public eye.

This novel is certain to be one of the main talking points when the Man Booker Prize is discussed this year, as well as one that will endure long after the controversies have died down. It is an exceptional piece of writing - a novel that readers will love and return to, time and time again.