The Yips

Storm clouds are gathering above the bar of Luton's less than exclusive Thistle Hotel. Among those caught up in the unfolding drama are a man who's had cancer seven times, a woman priest with an unruly fringe, the troubled family of a notorious local fascist, an interfering barmaid with three Es at A-level but a PhD in bullshit, and a free-thinking Muslim sex therapist with his considerably more pious wife. But at the heart of every intrigue and the bottom of every mystery is the repugnantly charismatic figure of Stuart Ransom - a golfer in free-fall.

Nicola Barker's The Yips is at once a historical novel of the pre- Twitter moment and the most flamboyant piece of comic fiction ever to be set in Luton.