The Autograph ManThis is the eagerly awaited follow up to the bestselling and prize winning "White Teeth", which established Zadie Smith as an outstanding new writer. Alex Li Tandem sells autographs. A small blip in a huge worldwide network of desire, it is his business to hunt for names on paper, collect them, sell them, occasionally fake them, and all to give the people what they want: a little piece of Fame. "The Autograph Man" is a deeply funny, existential tour

In emotional and physical turmoil he becomes a self-pitying recluse

this catches the attention of young Tom Marlowe as he passes by on an errand

born enemy of Rome

he is forced to play a game of survival by blood rules he thought he'd long left behind

mildly larcenous backwater

they find themselves drawn deep into the inner workings of an old and sinister church

Unpublishable by the more staid (and censored) presses across the Channel

building a shed in his garden

it'll be the heist of the century

as it trundles slowly on

is sacked from his latest job as a security guard in Harrods

It's a kind of emancipation