I PLAY THE DRUMS IN A BAND CALLED OKAY by Toby Litt
Hamish Hamilton £12.99 pp269

Clap is the drummer in an indie rock band. Their music sounds “like the Velvet Underground on quarter speed” and is fantastically successful. There are groupies at every hotel, hit singles, a headquarters stuffed with fawning staff. But despite a tendency to vomit over animals when drunk, Clap is a sensitive thinker. When he hits 39, he takes stock. He falls in love with a grown-up woman (as opposed to girls who bring their own condoms and leave when asked). He questions his lifestyle, dabbles in Buddhism, becomes a father, wrestles with his own mortality. Anyone expecting a bloke-ish romp will be disappointed - this is more low-key, but also far better: Litt rocks.

SUBMARINE by Joe Dunthorne
Hamish Hamilton £16.99 pp289

This book is so likeable it is hard not to feel maternal, both towards the protagonist, a teenager called Oliver, and the author, a 26-year-old poet with a gorgeous sense of humour. Dunthorne is a product of the creative-writing course at the University of East Anglia, and it shows - in the consistency and believability of his character. Oliver wrestles with the usual teenage angst: girls, sex, parents, often all at once, in lovely one-liners - “I've... heard my mother laugh during sex; I hope I've not inherited my father's problem”; “I've been thinking about telling people that I've been thinking about killing myself”. His thoughts progress sweetly with no nasty surprises, cataclysmic events or dark edges.

ONCE UPON A TIME IN ENGLAND by Helen Walsh
Canongate £14.99 pp359

In the northern town of Warrington, Robbie, a red-headed Irishman with an amazing singing voice, falls in love with Shusheela, a nurse from Kuala Lumpur. They marry and have two beautiful brown babies. Then, all their ambitions, hopes and dreams are slowly crushed by the town's racial prejudice and poverty. Walsh writes with conviction. An early scene where Shusheela is brutalised by skinheads is almost unreadably painful. This is a grim story - basically, everything goes horribly wrong. Walsh won a Betty Trask award for her first novel, Brass, and this is an unflinching follow-up, but not for the faint-hearted.

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