‘Probably the best English novelist of his generation’ Nick Hornby

Robin, a postgrad student in Coventry, has spent four and a half years not writing his thesis. Now it languishes in a drawer, and Robin hides in his room, increasingly frightened by a world he doesn’t understand. His friends have failed him and romance eludes him. His only outlet is his short stories, scribbled in notebooks and expressing his secret obsessions and frustrations.

Then, when an unfortunate and embarassing incident in a public park lands him in serious trouble, Robin’s life finally spirals out of control …