A cracking collection of short stories from the author of the stupendous ‘Swimmer’.

In the title story of this sharp, clever collection of short stories, an odd-job man arrives home to his Bradford council block to find a message waiting for one of its inhabitants…in ten-foot-high letters. With his white van and set of ladders, he’s the chief suspect. But who is the mysterious Slag that has the whole street gossiping; and who has she hurt?

In ‘Wrestling Jacob’, a lusty academic takes out his frustrations down on the farm every weekend, sparring with a fierce, strangely human ram. It’s hard work being beaten up by a sheep, but he soon realizes that his girlfriends love to see him wrestle Jacob…

And in ‘Coddock’, there’s a bold new chipshop owner in town. But who is he? And what do you get if you cross a cod with a haddock, anyway?

From the backstreets of Bradford to dingy moorland pubs with ten-year-old jukeboxes, Bill Broady’s bright new stories give Yorkshire a lick of new paint, with all of the searingly precise prose, wit and energy of his highly acclaimed first novel, ‘Swimmer’.