The autograph man

The Autograph Man is Zadie Smith's whirlwind tour of celebrity and our fame-obsessed times. Following one Alex-Li Tandem - a twenty-something, Chinese-Jewish autograph dealer turned on by sex, drugs and organised religion - it takes in London and New York, love and death, fathers and sons, as Alex tries to discover how a piece of paper can bring him closer to his heart's desire. Exposing our misconceptions about our idols - about ourselves - Zadie Smith delivers a brilliant, unforgettable tale about who we are and what we really want to be.'A glorious concoction written by our most beguiling and original prose-wizard' Independent on Sunday 'A brilliant comedy with a tantalising throb of mystic philosophy underneath' Philip Hensher, Books of the Year, Spectator'A pleasure from the first page to the last' Evening Standard'Intellectually agile ... ecstatic inventiveness' Time'A classic' Spectator 'Genuinely funny and entertaining' Guardian'Vibrant, highly imaginative' Jewish Chronicle'Full of irony, humour, the search for love and the fear of death . . . a touching, thoughtful, deeply felt rite-of-passage novel' Sunday Telegraph