These Days Lucy Caldwell (Faber, £12.99)
Homesickness Colin Barrett (Jonathan Cape, £14.99)
The Geometer Lobachevsky Adrian Duncan (Tuskar Rock, £14.99)
THE STUFFY OLD WORLD of publishing is no more immune to neophilia than the rest of our society and culture. In the UK there are numerous awards for first novels (Authors’ Club, Betty Trask, Costa, Desmond Elliott, to sample just the first four letters of the alphabet), but only one (Encore) for a second book. Two years ago, the great grandaddy of prizes, the Booker, confidently declared with its shortlist that of the six greatest novels written in English that year, four were debuts.
Publishers, when they circulate lists of forthcoming titles to the spavined nags of the literary world like yours truly, often highlight debuts, as though they are especially appealing rather than, in most cases, a necessary rite through which every author must pass on the way to perfecting their trade.
Debuts are appealing to the industry for two reasons: first,
