An author's novel has won rave reviews even though it has never been in print.

Carole Hayman's Hard Choices has been hailed as "terrifyingly good", "deliciously acid" and "a gem" by critics.

Fay Weldon loved it, Labour backbenchers clamoured to read it and Rory Bremner urged all who found the "self-righteousness and paranoia of Blair sinister" to rush out and buy it.

However, no one can rush out to buy Hard Choices because, in spite of the reviews, it has never been printed.

Carole believes publishers may have refused to touch the book because they are afraid of the political consequences if they do.

Now she has defied the attempt to strangle her words and published the book herself on the internet.

Carole, who lives in Kemp Town, Brighton, has published many novels and written several comic series for radio and TV.

Her Radio 4 series, Ladies Of Letters, has a regular audience of five million people, making it one of the most listened-to dramas in Britain.

She started her writing career in 1982 with a spoof TV soap, The Spinney, co-written with Adrian Mole creator Sue Townsend.

Since then, Carole says, she has never had any problems getting her work published. Until now.

Admittedly, there is something spooky about Hard Choices, completed in 1999. It tells the story of a spinned-out Britain led by a fanatically "nice" leader whose grin is more of a command than a smile.

Carole also wrote about a world struggling to survive global economic meltdown in the wake of a major international terrorist attack.

Carole said: "Hard Choices is about how easily democracy is eroded in times of stress. In times of deep crisis there is an anxiety which leads to greater central control.

"When I first thought about getting the novel published, in 1999, I didn't think there would be much of a problem.

"Then I started getting what my agent called rave rejections. People were saying they loved the book but they didn't think the timing was right to publish something like that.

"I would say they were scared and didn't want to antagonise the Government at such an early stage. I was shocked but not really surprised. I decided it was a waiting game and we would all have to hang on until the British public fell out of love with Tony Blair.

"When the book still didn't get published even as the Government's popularity began to wane, people started saying 'You are being suppressed'. At first I thought "Nah'. I would prefer to think it was more to do with the state of publishing, a cock-up rather than a conspiracy. But now I'm not sure."

Hard Choices tells the story of Grace Fry, minister for women, and Gideon Price, the country's leader and a born-again Christian whose slogan is "Stability is Sexy".

So finally, five years after she started researching it, Carole went online with Hard Choices.

Now readers can access the book they were not supposed to see by logging on and paying for the manuscript on the web.

To read Hard Choices, visit www.hardchoices.co.uk