This is the well-written, intelligent satire on celebrity we've been waiting for

Brilliant

Sardonic, sparkling, scathing

A topsy-turvy tour de force

The Afterparty is a blast: a pacy and amusing satire of celebrity shenanigans, wrapped in glittery postmodern sweetie-wrappers

Shockingly accomplished...what really sets the fresh style, biting satire and postmodern gymnastics ablaze is the brilliance of the writing

Amazing

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

The surreal peculiarities of North Korea are conjured in this brilliant multivoiced novel... laced with a mixture of parody and horror, which is all the more hilarious for being so hard to tell apart

Stunningly good

Like an epic version of George Orwell’s 1984, this novel ranges from the bottom of North Korea’s social ladder to its top, with plenty of affecting, wayward and even comic supporting characters. It’s the horror and absurdity of life in a totalitarian state as it might have been depicted by Balzac

Remarkable and heartbreaking . . . To [the] very short list of exceptional novels that also serve a humanitarian purpose The Orphan Master’s Son must now be added

Both visceral and gracious in approach he delicately balances the physical stress and strain of everyday lives with mental and emotional tolls