We need Stanley Middleton to remind us what the novel is about. Holiday is vintage Middleton. The result of Mr Middleton's analysis is so satisfying that one has to look at nineteenth-century writing for comparable storytelling.

At first glance, or even at second, Stanley Middleton's world is easily recognizable... The excellence of art, for Middleton, is an exact vision of real things as they are. And because he is himself so exact an observer, his world at third glance can seem strange and disturbing or newly and brilliantly lit with colour

Middleton is a born writer; unpretentious, discerning, intelligent... He is the Chekhov of suburbia.

Middleton is concerned with what goes on below the surface of lives, what people feel, dream about, hope for, resent, fear - all the things that in real life may be kept hidden... Anyone coming to Middleton afresh has a real treat in store.

Genuinely affecting

Topical and irreverent… In some hands, this might seem contrived, but Doyle’s impressive comic skills keep the laughter coming.

It is very funny, with an Alan Bennett sort of humour, beautifully written, quirky and likely to cause much tuttutting in conservative quarters

This lesbian coming of age story set in northern England doesn't seem to have aged a bit

An instant classic

You'll find everything you need to know about mustering the courage to embrace your true self and live life without fear in Winterson's hugely engaging semi-autobiographical novel

A stunning novel that's steeped in black history

A mind-blowing political statement, an anguished cry of despair . . . a bomshell

The definitive African book of the twentieth century.