This Parisian-born author is famous, not to say notorious, for his puns, parody, circular plotting, skittish wit and word-wizardry of all sorts

To read Georges Perec one must be ready to abandon oneself to a spirit of play. His books are studded with intellectual traps, allusions and secret systems, and they are prodigiously entertaining

Perec is serious fun

Perec was a polymathic genius, and his early death in 1982 (he was only 45) robbed France of its most dazzling experimental writer, one who tried everything and failed at nothing...He has, deservedly, become a cult in France, particularly with young Parisians, who instinctively (and rightly) identify him as the super-zapper, the biographer of their fragmented consumer culture, of which he was himself the creation

No punctuation, no pauses. This is the stuff of a dream comic monologue. Admirers of Perec will love the razor-sharp whimsy of this clever little tract, which could be so well delivered by a gifted stand-up such as Dylan Moran...In common with Thomas Pynchon, Perec had a love of literary devices, particularly catalogues, lists and descriptions of objects. Riddles, pubs, allusions and games dominate his work, Above all, though, for all the cleverness there is the punchy comic timing and an engaging humanity

More importantly, he's both celebrating and mocking the absurdly complex thinking that the human brain engages in while performing even the most simple of tasks. So on the basis of all this, can a computer create a work of art? In the end probably not, but when Perec's at the keyboard, it's a lot of fun watching it try

A satire for the author's day and oh yes our own on the subtly crushing effects of corporate life which was always after all the genius of Perec to marry a deeply humane melancholy with dazzling formal experiments of which this one is also deftly recursive simulation of the choices facing the writer of fiction as the text circles back on itself with varied refrains...delectable and philosophical office farce.

Effervescent

Wickedly fizzing dialogue... delightful prose

Clever, well paced and structured

Intriguing first novel... The narrative voice floes with wit and vigour...his debut ties author and reader in engaging knots that echo the tangled webs connecting the gossipers and photographers and their privileged fodder

It's uncommonly well written, with a bountiful supply of manic energy... Would Paul Auster kill to write a book as playful, fast-paced and unashamedly populist as this? Doubtful, but somewhere there's a "Paul Auster" who might

Sparky debut

Benedictus takes us on a trail of the contentious highs and lows of the rich and famous in a mixture of dark humour and sharp dialogue. For Benedictus, and his valiant debut novel, more of the same please

The story of the ultimate celeb after-party, it's a knowing wink at publishing and celebrity culture - a high-concept first novel sitting just the right side of salacious

The Afterparty avoids smugness partly because it has more affection that vitriol for the culture that it mocks... It's very funny, but sad, too... Well-drawn characters, smart dialogue and a canny plot