Equal parts Resident Evil and Hunger Games - and just as thrilling

The first fiery novel by the Brazilian national treasure

A genius

A truly remarkable writer

Lispector's novels offer a stark counterpoint to much of modern life's focus on individual fame

One of the twentieth century's most mysterious writers

The originality of Near to the Wild Heart lies in its technique and language: self conscious, bleakly humourous, but poetic ... We now finally have a translation worthy of Clarice Lispector's inimitable style. Go out and buy it.

This story is just as much about territory and escaping who you are, as it is about boxing. Full of sober realism and broken dreams, she's got the sort of narrative that would make Shane Meadows sit up.

A powerful debut from a talented new writer, filled with blood, sweat and tears.

Bare-knuckle fiction – tough, tender and lyrical. A fine first novel

A tremendous debut -- lean but capacious, elegant but tough, tempered but resonant. It marks the arrival of an important new talent.

Anna Whitwham's own East Side Story, set between two rival families in Clapton, is a vivid evocation of the worlds of old and new London, of the tribal immigrant experience built between boxing gym, tenement and canal bank. By turns brutal and beautiful, tender and dangerous, Boxer Handsome is a visceral and luminous debut.

Boxer Handsome is a story told in hope's shadow, where life, organised and disorganised, scars. This is a compelling novel - brutal, tender and true.

So good it hurts. Anna Whitwham joins the very best to have written about boxing: F.X. Toole, Joyce Carol Oates, Harry Crews and Norman Mailer.

Anna Whitwham's debut novel doesn't pull its punches. Well-written and worth watching

Rich in detail and elegantly written... Whitwham has considerable talent

The fights are described in glorious visceral detail but this unconventional love story is just about the ducks and dives as much as it is about the hits and wins. Whitwham's East Side Story packs a punch, and is a knockout debut her family could only be proud of

Here is a book that deals with its milieu head-on, and doesn't shrink from demonstrating that the ill-health and trauma experienced in these communities is genuine... This is a book that is truly written from within, and is therefore a powerful antidote to the snobbery infecting much of the clamour around how a large section of society is portrayed

Impressive… Gives voice to the furious, restrained beauty inherent in rigid masculinity… Whitwham certainly packs a punch

A compelling debut novel which beautifully explores the heart, physicality and working-class origins of boxing in East London