The Executor

Blake Morrison

Chatto & Windus €20.98 As the literary executor of Robert Pope, a middleranking poet, Matt Holmes’s task seems simple enough: to put together a collection of his late friend’s unpublished work. But when the poems turn out to contain hints of infidelity, incest and even murder, they not only pose a threat to Pope’s reputation but undermine Matt’s own life and marriage. Is he dealing with artistic inventions or actual confessions – and are a dead man’s wishes more important than his widow’s feelings? This novel dwells a bit too much on everyday preoccupations, but this is a neatly constructed mystery – and the poems are the best thing about it.