Part tender love story, part murder mystery, part coruscating description of a wasted life, and interspersed with some of the funniest poems about the mundane and the profound, Diary of a Somebody is a unique, original and hilarious novel. The 2 stars are for the poems which were great although I'd read quite a few of them on Twitter already. He’s like a poetic semi-grown-up Bridget Jones/Adrian Mole hybrid with infusions of Magnus Mills and Dan Rhodes and Rachel Joyce and Jonas Jonasson – but so much more than that too. I absolutely loved this book and found myself chuckling for days at the penguin in the freezer, the man at number 29 and Toby Salt's poems. But here it is, I did manage to irritate the daylights out of anybody within hearing distance while I read this, which is extra points right there.

It's a big comparison to make, in comic novel terms, but Brian Bilston - parodist and 'poet laureate of Twitter'- is worthy . Without doubt it should win next year's Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse prize for the best comic novel, even if my own novel is in contention as well -- Jonathan Coe Glorious. I am a big fan of Brian Bilston and really enjoyed his poetry collection You Took the Last Bus Home (2017). Ignore the "poetry" label - Bilston's witty verse is clever, silly, contemporary, wise and light and is only a small (but delicious) ingredient in this diary format adventure.It focuses on Brian, a 45-year-old sad sack with a yen for light verse and custard creams, who has decided he must change his life.

In 1892, George and Weedon Grossmith published The Diary of a Nobody, now a classic of comic writing. When you are in the slightly desperate state of needing a book which is going to make you laugh out loud on every page, the chances of picking one up are obviously vanishingly small.Having made his name as “the poet laureate of Twitter” – a dubious honorific – he published an excellent debut collection in 2016, You Took The Last Bus Home, which showcased his puckish wit, typographical twists and genius for wordplay. The poems form the first part of the entries in Brian's diary over the course of a year of numerous ups and downs for him. Despite not having any social media accounts and not being into twitter or tweeter or twatter, the synopsis really appealed to me. The plot is familiar - washed-up middle-aged guy is out of step with family, work and the wider world, but finds companionship and finally redemption through poetry and books.