Sorrow and Bliss

A compulsively readable debut novelspiky, sharp, intriguingly dark, and tenderabout a woman on the edge that combines the psychological insight of Sally Rooney with the sharp humor of Nina Stibbe and the emotional resonance of Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine.Martha Friel just turned forty. Once, she worked at Vogue and planned to write a novel. Now, she creates internet content. She used to live in a pied--terre in Paris. Now she lives in a gated community in Oxford, the only person she knows without a PhD, a baby or both, in a house she hates but cannot bear to leave. But she must leave, now that her husband Patrickthe kind who cooks, throws her birthday parties, who loves her and has only ever wanted her to be happyhas just moved out.Because theres something wrong with Martha, and has been for a long time. When she was seventeen, a little bomb went off in her brain and she was never the same. But countless doctors, endless therapy, every kind of drug later, she still doesnt know whats wrong, why she spends days unable to get out of bed or alienates both strangers and her loved ones with casually cruel remarks.And she has nowhere to go except her childhood home: a bohemian (dilapidated) townhouse in a romantic (rundown) part of Londonto live with her mother, a minorly important sculptor (and major drinker) and her father, a famous poet (though unpublished) and try to survive without the devoted, potty-mouthed sister who made all the chaos bearable back then, and is now too busy or too fed up to deal with her.But maybe, by starting over, Martha will get to write a better ending for herselfand shell find out that shes not quite finished after all.