Magnificent Joe

'A study of male friendship turned sour, this novel chills and convinces.'

'A dark, angry novel, tightly wound.'

'Wheatley is that increasingly rare type of young writer: he has experienced life, and it shows.'

'A great debut - If this book is anything to go by [Wheatley] will have a bright future.'

'Wheatley paints an interesting portrait of a stable situation disintegrating despite the best attempts to hold it together. Magnificent Joe is its author's first novel, and leaves me wondering where he might go next.'

'Raw and powerful, yet compelling and emotional.'

'This fine first book, half bildungsroman and half "state of England" novel, tells the story of Jim and his mates growing up in a village in the north of England - Wheatley can sure turn a phrase - A sweetly sad story.'

'Joe's the only magnificent one in this novel about working-class life – a grim and gritty novel, with a slight ray of hope at the end.'

'A brutal, sometimes moving book...written with a spare, unsentimental swagger and plenty of confrontational coal-black humour.'

'Taut, tense and tragic - a triumphant debut.'

'Strong and spare - witty and utterly convincing.'