Boxer Handsome

Outstanding and compelling... Called to mind the prose of the great Nell Dunn and reminded me of the vital, good fighter that the novel form is -- Ali Smith * New Statesman, Books of the Year *
Boxer Handsome tells the story of young Clapton boxer, Bobby, in the run up to the fight of his career. Whitwham is pitch-perfect on physicality, brutality and the pressures of masculinity at the heart of the sport, as well as authentically depicting a working-class community. -- Kerry Hudson * Herald Scotland *
A genuinely impressive debut. Boxer Handsome does everything great fiction should, offering up characters who stay with the reader long after the end of the book, giving an almost filmic vision of places and people, and revealing a world that most people will never even think about. If you can't see what it is that people need from boxing, or why it somehow persists into the 21st century, then read this. -- Bella Bathurst * Guardian *
Anna Whitwham's first novel does not read like a first novel. It is lean, polished and fit as its subject. The pleasure of reading the book is the sense throughout of a safe pair of hands at work on an unsafe subject – and a challenging city. This is a less-written-about London: depressed, tough and gallant (one can imagine it as a film by Ken Loach). -- Kate Kellaway * Observer, Debut Authors of 2014 *
Bristles with machismo... The prose – punchy and pungent – and Boby’s terse, frustrated voice keep you in your ringside seat * New Statesman *