High up in the Conrad Flats that loom bleakly over Acton, two future stars of th
e literary scene - or so they assume - are hard at work, tapping out words of wi
t and brilliance between ill-paid jobs writing captions for the Cat Calendar 198
5 and blurbs for trashy novels with titles like Brothel of the Vampire. Just twe
nty-one but already well entrenched in a life eked out on dole payments, pints a
nd dollops of porridge and pasta, Llewellyn and Cunningham don't have it too bad
: a pub on the corner, a misdirected parental allowance, and the delightful comp
any of Aoife, Llewellyn's model fiancee, mother of his young baby - and the woma
n of Cunningham's increasingly vivid dreams. Alan Warner's superb new novel sees
the author of Morvern Callar at the top of his game.
