Another booky benefit...

IF YOU haven’t yet worked your way through the 13 literary novels in the running for next month’s Man Booker Prize there’s no point starting now – the six-book shortlist is out on Wednesday.

Not much point starting then either, is there? Still, a quid on the nose is worth a thousand words, and after a squint at the judging panel, I reckon the 7/1 (Lads) about Isis-themed Home Fire by Kamila Shamsie (left) is, in the words of the late, great Jane Austen, ‘a right touch’.