Try finding someone who isn't fed up with politicians, bankers and the general air of malaise that permeates this rotten year of our Lord 2009. So it's time for a new sort of hero, an anti-hero. It's time for a man called Tomas. A man who comes from the ranks of abundant celebrity, a star of a popular TV show that requires him to traipse the Earth and curl out a stinking turd on some of the world's most famous venues. This is his story, and it involves murder, resurrection, bankers, love, prostitution, time travel and telekinetic aliens.

In this new novel from James Palumbo the world that currently both suffocates and liberates us is brought to vivid life in all its bloated, beguiling glory. Indignation, outrage and a general sense of maverick abandon are his weapons, so come on a journey that is, like our modern world, terrifying and bewitching in equal measure.

To illustrate this nefarious world the book inhabits are three short animations, showing us the dark heart at the centre of the corruption that this fantastical novel so despises.

Student pranks, you've got to love them. Just kids having a laugh before they enter the world of responsibility. It's just harmless fun, right? Not according to these North Carolina cops it isn't. It's a heinous crime tantamount to vandalism. This young guy stole some orange and white traffic barrels and created an awesome looking roadside monster thumbing a ride.

And it is awesome, even the construction company whose barrels he stole think it is and want him to recreate it. He's become something of a local celebrity, so who's the criminal now, huh? The man is an artist reduced to the status of a bum!

It just goes to show that sometimes the police misjudge things, what they see as vandalism others see as something creative, something fun that livens up the dull monotony of our repetitive, concrete world. So lighten up Mr Poe-leece!