Salmon Fishing in the Yemen - Tapa dura

It's hilarious and so well observed (Sir Christopher Meyer)

'A most diverting debut - ingenious, witty and moving, Yes Minister meets Monarch of the Glen.' (David Profumo)

'A wonderful book - a cry for humanity in our target-driven spin-riddled world.' Marina Lewycka (Marina Lewycka author of A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian)

I really loved this book. (Bill Nighy)

It is light, but succeeds in an ambitious project: making a book about fishing readable, even touching. Fish may not be your bag, but it is the capacity for commitment and belief that makes for good reading. (Nadia Saint NEW STATESMAN (22.1.07))

[a] wickedly comic first novel about the power of money and the miracle of faith. (SAGA (February))

This is a wonderful, enjoyable read...Written in a highly accessible pastiche of memos, letters, interview excerpts, journal entries and emails, Fishing, encompasses everything from the science of salmon spawning to the war in Iraq. But all these elements merely give structure to the story: a lovely musing on how risking it all - however much it may be perceived as foolish or ridiculous, can bring hope and faith and love to the most bleak of outlooks... (Daneet Steffens SCOTLAND ON SUNDAY (28.1.07))

[Salmon Fishing...] captivates the grumpiest reader within moments...if you imagine The Office crossed with Yes, Minister, you may get some inkling of how very funny it is...the intelligence, inventiveness and humanity of this novel in comparison to the usual run of literary fiction is as wild salmon to the farmed. (Amanda Craig TELEGRAPH (27.1.07))

Salmon Fishing in the Yemen has elements that were once familiar in numerous comic novels: a hapless innocent caught up in political machinations; an exotic setting; an upper-class girl for the romantic interest. But the political machinations here have a contemporary flavour. (Nicholas Clee TLS (2.2.07))

Entertaining storytelling with great characters and laugh-out-loud plot. (Fanny Blake WOMAN & HOME (March 2007))