Items25The creator’s order
  1. 1Sorrow and Bliss (2021)Sorrow and Bliss (2021) 10.0/10 on Open LibraryPublished 1 Jan 2021Martha's account of her marriage and family can be acerbically funny while describing a life repeatedly disrupted by mental illness. Mason lets the jokes expose defensiveness, affection and the damage people do to those trying to help. The illness is deliberately unnamed; assigning it a familiar…0
  2. 2Still Life (2021)Still Life (2021) 6.0/10 on Open LibraryPublished 1 Jan 2021A wartime encounter and an unexpected inheritance help bring a makeshift family together between London and Florence. Winman's humour lives in the company: arguments, pub talk, extravagantly individual habits and the pleasure of people returning. War, bereavement and disaster remain within that…0
  3. 3Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine (2017)Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine (2017) 8.4/10 on Open LibraryPublished 1 Jan 2017Eleanor's precise routines and blunt observations initially create a very funny distance from everyone around her. As friendship interrupts that arrangement, the same voice begins to reveal the cost of isolation. Honeyman makes everyday practical kindness matter, including helping a man who has…0
  4. 4Deacon King Kong (2020)Deacon King Kong (2020) 4.0/10 on Open LibraryPublished 1 Jan 2020Sportcoat's disastrous shooting of a young drug dealer sets a Brooklyn neighbourhood into overlapping motion. McBride finds comedy in the talking, misunderstanding and long-standing knowledge that connect its residents. The humour gradually makes the community's losses more particular: people have…0
  5. 5Nothing to See Here (2019)Nothing to See Here (2019) 8.0/10 on Open LibraryPublished 1 Jan 2019Lillian agrees to look after two children who burst into flames when agitated. Wilson treats that absurd premise with startling practical seriousness: someone still has to keep them safe, earn their trust and decide whose convenience matters. Lillian's dry voice keeps the story funny while exposing…0
  6. 6Margo's Got Money Troubles (2024)Margo's Got Money Troubles (2024) 8.0/10 on Open LibraryPublished 1 Jan 2024Twenty-year-old Margo needs money and childcare, and her improvised answer involves online sex work and advice from her former-wrestler father. Thorpe builds comedy from performance, storytelling and the gap between what an audience sees and what a parent has to manage. Financial pressure and the…0
  7. 7The friend (2018)The friend (2018) 8.0/10 on Open LibraryPublished 1 Jan 2018A writer inherits her dead friend's enormous Great Dane, despite living in a building that forbids dogs. The practical mismatch supplies comedy without making either grief or the animal's distress a joke. Nunez also brings a dry, sometimes severe wit to the literary world and its claims to wisdom.…0
  8. 8Rachel Incident (2023)Rachel Incident (2023)Published 1 Jan 2023Rachel and James turn their Cork bookshop friendship into a private world of jokes, ambitions and badly managed feelings. O'Donoghue lets the retrospective narration hold affection for their younger selves alongside a clear view of the harm they cause. Economic insecurity and reproductive choices…0
  9. 9PADDY CLARKE HA HA HA (1993)PADDY CLARKE HA HA HA (1993)Published 1 Jan 1993Ten-year-old Paddy's games, enthusiasms and quarrels give the first pages their irresistible energy. Doyle stays with the child's way of seeing as adult conflict becomes harder to ignore or understand. That continuity makes the comedy and the pain feel part of one consciousness. It is set in 1968,…0
  10. 10Shuggie BainShuggie BainAgnes's determination to look glamorous and the blunt exchanges around her can be very funny, even as her addiction damages the family. Stuart keeps Shuggie's tenderness close to the material and emotional work he is left to perform. This is among the hardest books here: neglect, sexual assault,…0