BOOK REVIEW / Novels in brief: Night Fishing - Patrice Chaplin: Virago, pounds 5.99

A documentary producer comes home from collecting a television award and notices for the first time that her son, Jaimie, has the crazed eyes of a drug user. This crisis, narrated by the producer, Janice, proceeds like a drama-documentary itself. We witness the guilt-ridden professional mother in panic, thwarted by medical services, infuriated by her celebrity ex-husband who insists on treatment from a Buddhist monk rather than a psychiatrist. Cautionary social realism with a minimum of frippery.