'A study of male friendship turned sour, this novel chills and convinces.'

– Financial Times

'A dark, angry novel, tightly wound.'

– Guardian

'Wheatley is that increasingly rare type of young writer: he has experienced life, and it shows.'

– Daily Mail

'A great debut - If this book is anything to go by [Wheatley] will have a bright future.'

– A Fiction Habit

'Wheatley paints an interesting portrait of a stable situation disintegrating despite the best attempts to hold it together. Magnificent Joe is its author's first novel, and leaves me wondering where he might go next.'

– Follow the Thread

'Raw and powerful, yet compelling and emotional.'

– New Books Magazine

'This fine first book, half bildungsroman and half "state of England" novel, tells the story of Jim and his mates growing up in a village in the north of England - Wheatley can sure turn a phrase - A sweetly sad story.'

– Publishers Weekly

'Joe's the only magnificent one in this novel about working-class life – a grim and gritty novel, with a slight ray of hope at the end.'

– Kirkus Reviews

'A brutal, sometimes moving book...written with a spare, unsentimental swagger and plenty of confrontational coal-black humour.'

– Metro

'Taut, tense and tragic - a triumphant debut.'

– Ben Myers, author of Pig Iron

'Strong and spare - witty and utterly convincing.'

– Jane Rogers, author of The Testament of Jessie Lamb