Paperbacks: The Brainstorm, by Jenny Turner

Vintage £7.99

When Lorna logs on to her to her email, she's confronted with the message: "You are your own worst enemy. You're a fucking nightmare". She has no idea if the message is for her, or where she is.

A "brainstorm" has left her struggling to comprehend the world around her. She pieces together the fact that she's the deputy editor of "the brainy section" of a national newspaper, alongside the fearsomely pompadoured Julie and Peter, a literary wannabe who resembles a "wise and sorrowful golden retriever". An existential satire of Nineties hacks that gets a little too fully in touch with the moral compromises of sequestered office life.