Blood, sweat and tyres : the little book of the automobile

With a quarter of million cars a day crowding onto the M25, and millions more standing nose-to-tail on our A-roads, Britain is now officially Europe's largest car park.

In Germany it's illegal to drive on a motorway at less than 37mph, but over here it can be a struggle even to reach such a speed during daylight hours.

Over-stressed, over-taxed, with petrol at well over a pound a litre and the morning and evening rush hours merging into one, UK motorists have become the slaves of the machine rather than its master.

People, even so, are still keen to go places - according to the Times the A-Z to of London is the most shoplifted book in Britain - and so far at least there's not better way of doing it than by car.

Written with the suffering millions in mind, Blood, Sweat and Tyres is the antidote. Casting a wry eye over the world of modern motoring, and highlighting some of its strangest and more bizarre aspects, it seeks to put the sheer awfulness of commuting into some kind of perspective. Or at least to give the victims - motorists, their passengers, friends and families - something funny to read and to reflect on whilst they join the queue.

Find out: why the most successful Le Mans driver of all time wishes he could race a 90 year old lady; why the Fab Three bullied Ringo into selling his favourite French supercar and how big a forest your average football team would need to plant to offset the massive carbon footprint of all the gas-guzzlers in the players' car park.