Night Haunts, By Sukhdev Sandhu

Some readers might hesitate about this "journey through the London night". It was commissioned by the cutting-edge artistic entrepreneurs Artangel and the cover puff from Michael Moorcock compares the book to Ian Sinclair.

However, the template mentioned by Sandhu serves to banish all qualms about dubious psychogeography. His model for nocturnal rambles was The Nights of London, a 1926 volume from HV Morton, "a beat – not Beat – journo". The result is a luminous series of sketches in Orwellian style, from cabbies and sewer flushers ("fat is the bane of their lives") to exorcists and Thames bargers ("Nobody knows we're here. Nobody"). This book is an atmospheric and witty companion, especially for those who, like Sandhu, spend the dark hours awake.