Jammy dodger

Life is sweet for would-be bohemian Artie Conville. Safe at the helm of his subsidised magazine-with a cosy office paid for by the tax-payer-he's content to drift along quoting poetry, lingering over long lunches and flirting with the lovely Rosie McCann. The main thing is to keep the real world-of nine-to-five jobs, mortgages and political violence-at bay.

So when his cushy number is threatened, Artie hatches a cunning plan to keep the funds coming in. But events quickly spiral out of control and before long he is up to his ears in a bizarre fraud. Can he avert disaster?

Will he get the girl? With a cast of characters that includes a gun-toting playwright, a jealous police chief, a drunken actor and a giant white rabbit, this is a rich and riotous tale about coming-of-age in 1980s Belfast; a novel that is by turns darkly ironic and laugh-out-loud funny. "Smith is a good writer, with a funny sensibility."-Publishers Weekly