Life Satire

If all goes according to plan, tonight will be Jack Current’s last. The young engineer is at the end of his emotional rope and plans to take his own life. But first, a bar crawl through his downtown Cincinnati neighborhood is in order. Accompanying him during his final hours is a dollar store notebook. The Drunk Log. In it, he documents the evening, ruminates on his existence and remembers his 7-year-old nephew, who died exactly a year earlier. It is a loss for which Jack feels responsible—a lapse in judgement for which there is no forgiveness. Buckling under the weight of oppressive ...

Newlywed Rosie has grown disenchanted with NYC. Inspired by Instagram ads, she starts thirsting for a rural life upstate—one full of beauty and authenticity. She just needs to convince her tech-bro husband, Jordan, of her vision for the future. Willing to do anything for Rosie’s happiness, Jordan signs on, and they offer—well above asking price—on a beautiful, historic fixer-upper in the Hudson Valley. But when Jordan suddenly loses his job, the couple is forced to rent out the property’s dilapidated outbuilding. There’s no heat, it’s overrun with mold, and nothing works.

Accidents happen. Especially around zombie turkeys. Then you add zombie humans, and problems proliferate. Mix in some ill-planned genetic engineering, and things get crazy. The insanity continues, from the story where zombies are merged with cucumbers to the one where two basement-dwelling nerds gain access to all video content from the past two hundred years - from aliens. Andy Zach pulls out all the stops on his imagination as he serves up this smorgasbord of silliness. Try it. Laughter is good for your soul.

When Mr Alec Quigley, superannuated insurance clerk, leaves the Bedfordshire bungalow of his indomitable niece Angela and makes his way to the Spanish village that he once read about in a history book, things are unlikely to go smoothly. A man with many foibles, not least his tendency to fantasise, his guardian Angela wants him home before he can get into any of the frequent scrapes that have dogged his – and, of late, her – existence. He is, however, intent on carving out a new life for himself in the Spanish interior and soon enlists the help of Fernando the fireman, Jorge the ...

ESPN's star comedic duo, Mike Golic and Mike Greenberg, bring their radio and TV sports shtick to the listener in this hilarious audiobook, which includes their definitive list of rules to live by. This is for all ESPN devotees, all Mike and Mike fans, and fans of audiobooks like Dennis Miller's Rants and Tony Kornheiser's As Bald as I Want to Be.

* BERYL AND FRED IN SPAIN now available, containing this book plus A Cat called Cheryl, with Fred and Beryl at a reduced price.* When Beryl and Fred decide to sell up and take a camper van tour around Spain with their lovable Cocker Spaniel, Ted, little do they realise how eventful their poorly planned trip will turn out to be. Intending to tour the whole country thoroughly in an anti-clockwise direction, one unexpected incident after another throws them off track and sees their faithful VW Camper, Vernon, transporting them to the south coast well ahead of any real or imagined schedule. ...

In a provocative novel addressing contemporary immigration by the sharply observant Lionel Shriver, a New York family takes in a Honduran migrant—who may or may not be the innocent paragon she claims to be.

Welcome to Everywhere! This Satirical Survival Guide for Modern Life is the Most Hysterically Serious Field Manual Ever. Dive into the absurdity, hypocrisy, and chaos of modern society with How to Find Hookers & Dope Everywhere You Go. Equal parts scathing critique and laugh-out-loud satire, this book exposes the ridiculous systems we’re all trapped in—whether we like it or not. Just because it is funny does not mean it is not true. From the commodification of culture to the billion-dollar industries that profit from addiction, no stone is left unturned in this hilariously cynical ...

Dinner is served - with a little something on the side. A Brooklyn wife is too sharp to allow her husband’s wandering eye to get the best of her in this witty short story of a dinner party with a delicious comeuppance. Eleanor and Jonathan have joined a few of their most irritating best friends for an intimate catered gathering. Through all the intellectual chatter, Eleanor’s on watch. Jonathan has already confessed to wanting an open marriage, and tonight, Eleanor has decided to accommodate him. Just not quite the way he expects.

Eight years have passed and in 2016 many things have changed for the eccentric Trelawney family. In the months leading up to the Brexit referendum, Ayesha, the beautiful, young secret daughter of the late Enyon Trelawney, has married the much older thuggish banker Tomlinson Sleet with whom she has a young daughter, Stella. Ayesha is busy restoring the once broken-down Trelawney Castle in Cornwall, which Sleet has bought, to its former glory, as well as studying art at the Courtauld in London.

Based on his widely read columns for The New Yorker, Ian Frazier’s uproarious first novel, The Cursing Mommy’s Book of Days, centers on a profoundly memorable character, sprung from an impressively fertile imagination. Structured as a daybook of sorts, with the Cursing Mommy - beleaguered wife of Larry and mother of two boys, twelve and nine - trying (more or less) valiantly to offer tips on how to do various tasks around the home, only to end up on the ground, cursing, surrounded by broken glass.

A newborn set of twins, a new apartment, and the ensuing chaos are keeping Ben and Kirsty on their toes, but their challenges don't stop there. Kirsty is an exhausted new mother, and Ben isn't faring much better. On top of that, their communication skills could be better compared to a comedy of errors or a Greek tragedy. The last thing Kirsty needs is for their zany extended family to bring their own issues into the mix, but the problems just keep on coming. It’s just as well that love will always find a way.

Start with a pinch of paradise. Add a cup of sweet and witty banter. Then drizzle with chocolate Weddings are about three things: The bride, the dress, and the cake. I’ve never been the marrying kind. Far too much commitment in happily ever afters. Dresses? Not for me. Not as long as leggings and yoga pants exist. But cake? I’ve got cake covered. Nobody does cake like I do. I don’t origami, I can’t change my own tires. But when it comes to cake? I’ll make a grown man cry. Cupcakes. Sponge Cakes. Angelfood. Devils Food. Anything in between. You show me a cake and I’ll make it my ...

Esther Wells goes on a diet and the scales fall from her eyes. Depriving themselves of fatty foods, both husband and wife have new perspectives on each other, and the process is one of slow destruction of their marriage. Esther tells in flashback, from the depths of her basement apartment in Earls Court, the history of her marital disaster - in between her consumption of chocolate cake, tinned fruit, sweet sherry and a host of other high-calorie goodies.

Is there any chance of a second date? That all depends on what a woman and a man are willing to invest in the first, in this quick-witted short story of a perfectly equitable modern romance. After 10 years of bad blind dates, Candace is having a hard time believing Patrick is so spot-on. He’s sharp, handsome, and kind - her mind can’t help racing to where it all will lead. Then the check arrives. It’s time to get real.

Wannabe actress Dani Steele's résumé resembles a cautionary tale on how not to be famous. She's pushing thirty and stuck in a dead-end insurance job, and her relationship status is holding at uncommitted. With unbearably perfect sisters and a mother who won't let her forget it, Dani has two go-tos for consolation: maple scones and a blog in which she pours her heart out to her celebrity idol. He's the man her father never was, no boyfriend will ever be - and not so impossible a dream as one might think.

Every summer, a once-sort-of-famous cartoonist named Rich Fischer leaves his wife and two kids behind to teach a class at a weeklong arts conference in a charming New England beachside town. It's a place where, every year, students - nature poets and driftwood sculptors, widowed seniors, teenagers away from home for the first time - show up to study with an esteemed faculty.

*BERYL AND FRED IN SPAIN now available, containing this book plus Beryl, Fred and a Dog called Ted at a reduced price.* Beryl and Fred Pedley, doyens of the Spanish travelling scene since the publication of Fred’s poignant memoir of their maiden voyage with their faithful dog Ted, are hitting the road in Vernon the camper van once again. Ted, sadly, is no longer with us, but in his place we meet Cheryl, a remarkably talented cat and the author of this volume. After selling their unwanted cottage on the Isle of Lewis, we follow their journey to the isolated village of Puebla de Don ...

Jack Gladney is the creator and chairman of Hitler studies at the College-on-the-Hill. This is the story of his absurd life - a life that is going well enough until a chemical spill from a rail car releases an Airborne Toxic Event, and Jack is forced to confront his biggest fear: his own mortality. White Noise is an effortless combination of social satire and metaphysical dilemma in which Don DeLillo exposes our rampant consumerism, media saturation and novelty intellectualism.

Taylor Bell comes from a long line of Beta Zeta sorority sisters, all of whom expect her to pledge upon starting at the university. However, Taylor is determined to destroy the rich tradition they hold so dear by eschewing sorority life altogether. Taylor's resolve soon melts, though, when she falls in with a group of hilarious, ultra-saucy girls who introduce her to all things Greek and soften her to the idea of joining.