In 2017, I lost one of my best friends. He was one of those magical people—charismatic, impossibly talented, hilariously funny. So, in the aftermath of his death, I noticed many people in his life competing for recognition of their bond with him. Unfortunately, he wasn’t there to recognize anyone. Though the stories are completely different, that experience inspired me to write Competitive Grieving, spotlighting the common—but rarely discussed—process of navigating someone’s life and relationships in their absence. For me, humor is the ultimate coping mechanism, as is the promise of brighter days, so the book attacks this serious topic with levity, honesty, and a bit of hope.
After a broken engagement, Ruth arrives home to stay with her mother and her father, who has recently been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. Spare, poignant, and honest, this novel chronicles a daughter’s attempts to navigate a new normal with her “erratically lucid” and “lucidly erratic” parents. While the topic is innately heavy, somehow Khong manages to make the book light and as much about the narrator’s own flaws and struggles as about the illness at hand. It’s refreshing and touching and all the things—and also written in an unusual structure with mini vignettes throughout.
'Khong is a magician ... Brilliant' Lauren Groff, author of Fates and Furies
'Khong's first novel sneaks up on you - just like life, illness and heartbreak. And love. A million small, human and often deeply funny details gather force to tell a tale that is ultimately, incredibly poignant' Miranda July, author of The First Bad Man
Ruth is thirty and her life is falling apart: she and her fiance are moving house, but he's moving out to live with another woman; her career is going nowhere; and then she learns…
Equal parts heartbreaking and hilarious, this almost farcical book tells the story of Judd Foxman, who isn’t having the best week: his father has died, his wife is having a public affair with his boss and now he’s forced to sit shiva with his entire dysfunctional family. It’s rare that a novel makes you laugh out loud, but also well up. I guess I might feel a personal connection here, being Jewish and having attended many shivas myself. But Tropper has a way of telling the story that makes your laughter like its own therapy.
A riotously funny, emotionally raw New York Times bestselling novel about love, marriage, divorce, family, and the ties that bind-whether we like it or not.
The death of Judd Foxman's father marks the first time that the entire Foxman clan has congregated in years. There is, however, one conspicuous absence: Judd's wife, Jen, whose affair with his radio- shock-jock boss has recently become painfully public. Simultaneously mourning the demise of his father and his marriage, Judd joins his dysfunctional family as they reluctantly sit shiva and spend seven days and nights under the same roof. The week quickly spins out…
Tap Dancing on Everest, part coming-of-age memoir, part true-survival adventure story, is about a young medical student, the daughter of a Holocaust survivor raised in N.Y.C., who battles self-doubt to serve as the doctor—and only woman—on a remote Everest climb in Tibet.
Ove doesn’t want help. Ove wants to be left to kill himself in peace. But his damn chatty neighbors, and one irritating cat, keep interrupting. As he mourns the death of his beloved wife, this aging curmudgeon finds a renewed sense of family and purpose in the most unexpected places. In this day and age, I think anything that makes you feel good about humanity is worth its weight in gold. This book is just charming and feel-good and attacks serious topics with a kind of levity and authenticity that makes you feel like a member of the neighborhood. Like all of us, Ove is a deeply imperfect being, but we love him all the same.
'A JOY FROM START TO FINISH' - Gavin Extence, author of THE UNIVERSE VERSUS ALEX WOODS
There is something about Ove.
At first sight, he is almost certainly the grumpiest man you will ever meet. He thinks himself surrounded by idiots - neighbours who can't reverse a trailer properly, joggers, shop assistants who talk in code, and the perpetrators of the vicious coup d'etat that ousted him as Chairman of the Residents' Association. He will persist in making his daily inspection rounds of the local streets.
First of all, Nora Ephron is a genius, so there’s that. In this story, based loosely on the writer’s own life, Rachel Samstat is grieving, but it’s not because someone died. It’s because sometimes she wishes someone would. In this seminal novel, the main character, a pregnant cookbook author, discovers her husband is in love with someone else and finds herself at once cursing him and wishing to have him back. Sometimes in life, we mourn though no one has perished—we mourn a part of ourselves, a time in our lives, a relationship that’s fractured or changed. I just find this to be such a truism and, of course, this story takes you on a tumultuous journey underscored by Ephron’s signature wit and humor. It’s iconic.
If I had to do it over again, I would have made a different kind of pie. The pie I threw at Mark made a terrific mess, but a blueberry pie would have been even better, since it would have permanently ruined his new blazer, the one he bought with Thelma ... I picked up the pie, thanked God for linoleum floor, and threw it' Rachel Samstat is smart, successful, married to a high-flying Washington journalist... and devastated. She has discovered that her husband is having an affair with Thelma Rice, 'a fairly tall person with a neck as long…
Desperate to honor his father’s dying wish, Layken Martin vows to do whatever it takes to save the family farm. Once the Army discharges him following World War II, Layken returns to Missouri to find his legacy in shambles and…
Okay. Fine. Maybe I only think this book is about loss because I know that, in later books, the same Glass family suffers losses and this sets the stage. But this isa story about a promise that is never realized and a relationship that is becoming progressively distant—and, in it, there is a sense of being lost if not having experienced a loss, specifically. In it, Buddy Glass takes Army leave to attend his brother’s wedding, but his brother never shows up. Somehow, Buddy winds up stuck in a limo with a group of disgruntled guests from whom he tries to hide his identity. In his sense of isolation, but also his awareness of the situation’s absurdity, we find humor and also sadness.
A Note from the Author: The two long pieces in this book originally came out in The New Yorker - RAISE HIGH THE ROOF BEAM, CARPENTERS in 1955, SEYMOUR - An Introduction in 1959. Whatever their differences in mood or effect, they are both very much concerned with Seymour Glass, who is the main character in my series about the Glass family. Oddly, the joys and satisfactions of working on the Glass family peculiarly increase and deepen for me with the years. I can't say why, though. Not, at least, outside the casino proper of my fiction.
Wren’s closest childhood friend is dead. Stewart Beasley. Gone. But instead of weeping, she’s dreaming up funeral plans for everyone from strangers to family members (none of whom show signs of imminent demise). Stewart surrounded himself with questionable characters. And when his icy mother asks Wren to sort his possessions alongside Stewart’s maddening, but oddly charming lawyer, Wren is forced into a tug-of-war over her friend’s memory. She wonders, did she even know this person who she once considered an extension of herself? Can you ever truly know anyone?
Competitive Grieving is a dark comedy—and unlikely love story—about the chaotic aftermath of loss. The story spotlights the universal struggle to grieve amidst the noise and to love with a broken heart.
Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz, this brilliant 17th century nun flew through Mexico City on the breeze of poetry and philosophy. She met with princes of the Church, and with the royalty of Spain and Mexico. Then she met a stunning, powerful woman with lavender eyes, la Vicereine Maria…
The Birthright of Sons is a collection of stories centered around the experiences of marginalized people, namely Black and LGBTQ+ men. Although the stories borrow elements from various genres (horror, suspense, romance, magical realism, etc.), they are linked by an exploration of identity and the ways personhood is shaped through…
