Manchester may well have take British music hostage over the last decade or so, but its contribution to British literature has long been overlooked. In this essay I draw attention to Manchester's considerable literary heritage and explore the way the city has been portrayed by writers and received by readers. I pay particular attention to the reasons why Manchester has not come to be considered a literary town, dispute its formidable literary output. I conclude the paper with a tongue-in-cheek sight-seeing tour around areas of the city that have so far been immortalised in print.