Since they formed in 1989, The Beautiful South have become on of the biggest selling acts in the UK. Their greatest hits album compilation was, for a while, the fastest selling release in the UK , and their album Blue is the Colour sold 1.5 million copies. They have also run up 17 hit singles. This book is the authorized story of The Beautiful South. Mike Pattenden, of The Times, Vox and Arena, has been granted access behind the scenes to the band themselves and their associates, both past and present, in order to tell the story of the last decade. From the early days of Norman Cook and The Housemartins, right up to the released of the new album in the autumn of of 1998; from Paul Heaton's outspoken left-wing politics with attitude to his twin obsessions of Sheffield United and Italian football; from the acrimonious split from Go! Discs to a profile of the city of Hull, its pubs, and its influence on the several members of the and who were born and bred there, The Liar's Bar is a definitive book about The Beautiful South.