The Mercy Boys, by John Burnside (Vintage, £5.99 in UK)

This second novel from one of Britain's most established youngish poets and author of a truly shocking debut, The Dumb House (1997) features a quartet of hard-drinking Dundee men all seeking escape in their local. Each of them has difficulties with women. The violent, dog-hating Rob has become increasingly estranged from the woman he lives with and his dreams of revenge become a reality. Sconnie realises the father he thought he knew was a stranger. Junior has decided it's easier to pretend his bed-ridden wife is dead, while Alan, the thinker, who merely exists from one binge to the next, is further disturbed by a new relationship. Clearly an intelligent, resourceful narrative written in exact, often vivid prose; yet Burnside allows this intelligence and interest in sensation to dribble away into an ultimately predictable excess, leaving the reader asking whether he simply lost interest as well as control.