The Laying On Of Hands by Alan Bennett (Profile, £6.99)

I ALWAYS think it best to read Bennett with his master's voice running through your head.

Though to approach this long, short story (printed first in June, in The London Review of Books) listening to Bennett speak in those tones of trans-Penine northerness may not be enough to sweeten its taste for blue-rinse middle England.

I'll say this quietly for fear of offence... the F-word appears on four occasions and the subject, though topical, is not something you bandy about over a pot of tea and a nice cream fancy.

In shades of My Night With Reg, a clergyman "of Romish inclinations" whose betters note "tends to confuse God with Joan Crawford" presides over a memorial service to a masseur.

Clive has died in Peru, from circumstances undisclosed and foolishly the cleric - himself a friend of the deceased - asks the congregation to share memories of him.

The dark comedy is played around the cause of death and a deaf interloper mistaken for the dead man's aunt. (The only aids she has come across are deaf aids and hers plainly isn't working.)

Some who had known Clive well - he was non-partisan with his favours - are only too aware of the future they could face. Others sit in silence. (His wife, who was keeping quiet, shifted in her seat slightly, as she was suffering from thrush, or that was what she hoped.)

Bennett's humour is driven by the petit-bourgeous standing on ceremony. He has a taste for the precision and exoticism of language and for what it tells us about character.

The observation here is, of course, spot on.

David Chapman