With ‘the last stitch, just in case and by custom, through the poor unfortunate frigging jolly Jack Tar’s nose. In a year when the Women’s Prize for Fiction was formally launched, it feels appropriate that the winner this year is a representative of exactly the kind of predictable, safe, male/middle class establishment that the average person on the street probably imagines when they think of the Booker, and with a book that fits all the cliches (at least superficially) of that “genre. By rotating the speaking voices Mr Swift gradually pulls together a whole believable world, past and present, around the major characters, both those on the final journey and those staying behind. Nothing could more embody this than the seaside pier – a flimsy-looking structure dedicated to fun and frivolity, deliberately constructed over the crashing waves. Graham Swift grew up in south London, and presumably knows the local habits and speech patterns better than – say – Martin Amis knows Lionel Asbo's.

He borrowed money from Vince, without telling him what he needed it for and gave it to Ray to bet it on a long shot race for Amy.

Amy has been to see the body, and it’s ‘like something special had happened to her and she wanted to share it. As the back stories build you get a growing sense of the happenstance in life and how one moment's decision can change everything and resonate down the years. For this is a novel that works primarily on a domestic scale – especially if you count the pub as an extension of the front room. I did have a problem though, right from the very first sentence, which reads: "It aint like your regular sort of day.

She had her own ideas about that, and when he more or less immediately contracted his terminal cancer, the idea came to nothing. At best it will be a celebration of life and at least, when times get hard, it will be a glow in the dark. By using the Web site, you confirm that you have read, understood, and agreed to be bound by the Terms and Conditions. Without spelling it out, Swift seems to want to show that these ordinary, unglamorous men can reach conclusions every bit as thoughtful as any others in fiction.

Moreover the evocation of working class South Londoners is magnificent, but would be recognised by people anywhere. Graham Swift is one of my favourite authors, and I’m interested that he’s chosen this very male world. Four men take the ashes of a friend, Jack Dodds, to Margate, to scatter them off the end of the pier. The quartet gathers to scatter Jack's ashes in Margate, where he had hoped to retire to a small seaside cottage with his wife Amy (Helen Mirren), a dream that was never fulfilled. I’d add something rather personal about the characters – not just the men who gather in a Bermondsey pub to go on their journey, but also one or two other characters who don’t accompany them, including one central female one.