"What I did to them was terrible but you have to understand the context. This was London 2016.” So begins Luke Brown’s second novel Theft, setting up the ever-so-slightly-facile conceit of man-in-crisis vs country-in-crisis. What follows is a frequently-hilarious meditation on class, and loss, as well as a portrait of contemporary London, seen through the eyes of an outsider.

Our protagonist, Paul, is a coke-snorting, self-obsessed Dalstonite, who has the job every literary millennial covets above all: a part-time role at that sanctum sanctorum, the London Review of Books bookshop. He spends the rest of his time haunting Hackney, reviewing books and – more lucratively – haircuts for the absurd fashion magazine White Jesus. Recent events have caused him to take stock of his life: the arrival of his mid-30s, the death of his mother and the breakdown of his relationship make him wonder whether he’d be more successful “if I had put to another use the ten thousand hours I had discussed the meaning of love with idiots who would not leave my sofa”.

Enter Emily Nardini, a reclusive novelist who “had not consented to an interview in 10 years”. In something of a coup, our narrator manages to score a tête-à-tête with Nardini – and, improbably, to catapult himself into her life, her relationship and her soon-to-be-stepdaughter’s knickers. The consequences are disastrous.

Brown is an exceptionally stylish writer. From the first page, it is clear we have the steadiest of hands on the tiller. He’s also supremely literary and, as an editor of fiction, and a contributor to the Times Literary Supplement and London Review of Books, he knows the scene he satirises. The dialogue is crisp and true-to-life, the description intuitive. Every joke lands.

My problem with this novel is Paul, our unreliable – and detestable – narrator. Of course, detestability is not a problem in and of itself; many of our most compelling protagonists are anti-heroes: Patrick Bateman, John Self, Tony Soprano. One need only read Ottessa Moshfegh’s Eileen and My Year of Rest and Relaxation for recent masterclasses in inviting monsters into our hearts. Theft’s problem is that Paul is loathsome without ever being interesting, or inspiring empathy. His peccadilloes are modern clichés: he explains women’s political views back to them. He is intellectually arrogant. He is controlling, particularly of his sister, Amy, and of his two love interests, who happen to be stepmother and stepdaughter. Brown knows that Paul’s a rotter; a character who “hates good guys” while yearning to “be a better man”. But he’s just not compelling enough to get us on side: whether that omission is intentional or not is hard to tell.