A NEW pub guide written by a well known city author could be just the tonic for Worcester's pub and bar scene.

For two years, former journalist and press officer Bob Blandford wrote a sometimes-notorious pub guide using the nom de plume Bob Backenforth.

He is now reprising the role of pub scribe in a comprehensive new guide to the city’s current 88 pubs, alongside 50 lounge and café bars, 36 clubs and community centres, 200-plus restaurants, takeaways and off-licences, as well as sports and education venues licensed to sell drinks – more than 500 in total.

Due for publication mid-summer, he is aiming to make his 300-page Bob Backenforth’s Worcester Pub Guide 2016 a much-needed shot in the arm for the city’s pubs and bars.

Also included will be profiles of around 75 brewers and cider-makers serving Worcester, with pub trails, incentives to visit every pub and an opportunity to vote for Pub of the Year, Beer of the Year and other accolades.

But the stars of the show will be the city’s pubs – each of which gets a two-page profile of around 800 words detailing what is on offer, their specialities, reasons for visiting, and illustrations, at no charge to the licensee.

Mr Blandford said: "People still remember the old Bob Backenforth from 1981-2 but that was precisely half my life ago - the new Bob Backenforth is wiser, mellower and in no doubts about the current state of the pubs scene.

“Somebody’s got to do something for the pubs before they become a relic of the past, and no amount of fiddling around the edges – like, talk of community assets and CAMRA calling itself something else – is going to make the slightest scrap of difference.

“The pubs need action and they need it now.”

The former Berrows Journal associate editor is also the city’s top-selling author with two volumes of Bob Backenforth’s Worcester Pubs Then and Now both topping the local best-sellers list, a third volume already written, and more books under way including the definitive history of Worcester City Police.

The guide will be outline each pub’s essential character and emphasise its plus-points and is aimed at tourists and locals.

It is designed to fit in a pocket, handbag or glove compartment.

“Aside from being a comprehensive pub guide, it’s also intended as a good read in its own right.

“Essentially, it’s a personal and sometimes tongue-in-cheek observation that’s the outcome of 50 years of dedicated Worcester pub-going.

"Of course, not every pub or bar in Worcester is going to come out as the best of the bunch, but it won’t be a hatchet-job either.

"Every pub has its own unique ‘draw’ and that’s what I’m aiming to bring out.

“Unlike the old Bob, I’m not passing judgment on the quality of each pub’s beer or food.

"The state of the industry is too fragile for that.”

Worcester Pub Guide 2016 will be available in the city’s pubs with advance copies direct from bob.backenforth@worcester-pubs.co.uk.

Priced around £9, it is one of two books planned for publication this year by the award-winner who also owns and hosts the 2,500-member FB group Worcester Pubs Then and Now listing regular updates and other news of the city’s pubs.