One Day I Shall Astonish the World

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One Day I Shall Astonish the World by the always entertaining Nina Stibbe is a story of female friendship' Irish Times, Books To Look Out For In 2022 A true gift of a novel, I utterly adored it. For as long as I could make it last, the world just felt a bit nicer.' Meg Mason Nina Stibbe's latest novel, One Day I Shall Astonish the World buttresses her position as the Kingsley Amis of the twenty-first century. . . . Stibbe's genius, like Amis's, is for noting the cadences of ordinary speech and the idiotic platitudes we all spout. In the anatomy of English conversation, Stibbe (born 1962) takes up where Amis (died 1995) left off. There are echoes of Adrian Mole, Alan Bennett and Victoria Wood - but with no copying or pastiche. Stibbe makes the everyday funny. If a Martian asked me to explain the tragicomedy of normal English life, I would direct him to Stibbe -- Harry Mount * Spectator, 2022 Books of the Year * Joyful. Stibbe's comedy probes what it means to become an adult' Daily Telegraph on 'Reasons to be Cheerful'

One Day I Shall Astonish the World by the always entertaining Nina Stibbe is a story of female friendship * Irish Times, Books To Look Out For In 2022 * What is so marvellous about Stibbe as a writer is that she is so acutely observant of every day life. And she is brilliant at pinning it down and in a few, deft sentences, showing you the absurdities and the horrors of ordinary life. Dystopian Fiction Books Everyone Should Read: Explore The Darker Side of Possible Worlds and Alternative Futures But now, thirty years later, faced with a husband seeking immortality and Norma out of reach on a wave of professional glory, Susan begins to wonder whether she has made the right choices about life, love, work, and, most importantly, friendship. While there may be echoes of previous greats, however, Stibbe's voice is utterly her own. One Day I Shall Astonish the World is, unsurprisingly, very funny. But it might also be Stibbe's most moving novel yet. So hilarious and rewarding' Irish Business PostWarm and wonderfully well-observed . . . One Day I Shall Astonish The World reminds us that the richness of life is in its small details, not the grand plans. This is author Stibbe at her entertaining and heartwarming best * Sunday Express * At the start, I felt the humour was forced, too many scenes where the author was trying to make the reader laugh. But I did warm to Susan and I laughed out loud a few times once we got going, and welled up once. I love everything Nina Stibbe writes and this was my favourite of the novels. It's so sharp and painful and brilliantly funny. There are sentences you could eat for Christmas dinner. If you haven't read it already - you probably have but just in case - I really do think you'd love it -- Katherine Rundell This is Stibbe’s first work of fiction away from the Vogel family, a comic trilogy whose final instalment was published in 2019. Readers familiar with the books will remember the middle-child narrator Lizzie Vogel as clever, funny and insightful. These traits are evident in Susan too, though in a quieter and less obvious way. As the quotation above shows, Susan is slow on the uptake, wilfully slow, a middle-aged woman with an administrative job at a university and a marriage that appears to be unravelling. Nina Stibbe's new novel is the story of the wonderful and sometimes surprising path of friendship: from its conspiratorial beginnings, along its irritating wrong turns, to its final gratifying destination. About This Edition ISBN:

Stibbe ( Reasons To Be Cheerful) chronicles the 30-year friendship between Susan and Norma. Divided into three parts—friendship, work, and marriage—the story of their connection ebbs and flows in direct correlation to the success of their personal lives. When Susan aims to better herself or her career, Norma can be counted on to discourage her. When Norma disappears for regular intervals, traveling or falling in love with someone new, Susan steps up to cover her responsibilities. Throughout the decades of conversations about men, children, and sex, the division of power in their relationship remains uneven. It is Susan who begins to realize, as she matures, that she may never have really known Norma at all. When tensions convene at the women's main battleground, the college where they both work (whose motto is the same as the book's title), it is Susan's tenacity and humor that ultimately win the day, changing their dynamic once again. VERDICT Stibbe skillfully captures the humor that comes with everyday defeat, and the friendship of Susan and Norma will ring true for many women. —Tina Panik Library Journal Lauren Graham: 'Why are men still surprised they like Gilmore Girls?' 24 November, 2023 The 20 best children’s books for Christmas 2023 24 November, 2023 How They Broke Britain by James O'Brien is full of anger - and not much else 23 November, 2023 While there may be echoes of previous greats, however, Stibbe's voice is utterly her own . . . One Day I Shall Astonish the World is, u nsurprisingly, very funny. But it might also be Stibbe's most moving novel yet . . . so hilarious and rewarding * Irish Business Post * The wayward, wildly original and beautifully noticing sentences are perfectly cadenced . . . Despite the sparkling, satirical voice, and her laughter at the littleness of Little England, Stibbe creates a world in which tolerance and forgiveness are the key, even in these dark and scary times, to the possibility of a happy life * Daily Telegraph *Certainly, Susan’s idle observations about her “clinically irritating” sister-in-law, or her husband’s ex who “once forced a boyfriend to the cinema at knife point to see a film he didn’t fancy” made me bark with laughter. Susan – never Sue (“I’m like Susan Sontag in that respect,” she deadpans) – is the narrator. Talking is her way of coping with anxiety, yielding a richly digressive text with ample comic insights into everything from revenge (her brother uses his unfortunate wife as “a weapon with which he could punish the world for not respecting him the way it should”) to the difficulty of “nice” people (you always have to wonder if they “secretly despise you or feel bitterly jealous or just think you common but want someone to go to the cinema with”). While comparisons with Alan Bennett and Sue Townsend remain apt, Stibbe applies her own darkly distinctive touches Clever and funny, it takes a sharp look at the intricacies of marriage, friendship, work, and driving. As with all Stibbe's writing there is a pleasingly perfect balance of wisdom with jokes -- Cathy Rentzenbrink

Clever and funny, it takes a sharp look at the intricacies of marriage, friendship, work and driving. As with all Stibbe's writing there is a pleasingly perfect balance of wisdom with jokes' Cathy Rentzenbrink Funny, charming, odd-in-the-best-way and gorgeously uplifting! A delight from start to finish * Marian Keyes on 'Reasons to be Cheerful' *A book begging to be read on the beach, with the sun warming the sand and salt in the air: pure escapism. Emotional upsets and surprises are interleaved with eccentricity in this latest slice of offbeat Englishness. It's darker than Stibbe's previous novels, but her trademark wit is still in evidence and her odd and eccentric characters remind us that we are odd and eccentric too!' Red, Book of the Month Nina Stibbe's very funny novels are full of charm, and her latest brilliantly captures the mordant humour of British suburban life. Through the 90s to the present day, it follows Susan from her job in a haberdashery shop to working at the local university, and the ebbs and flows of her relationships with her husband and best friend * Evening Standard, Best Fiction Books to Look Forward to in 2022 * In April look out for... Love, Nina writer Nina Stibbe's One Day I Shall Astonish The World * Daily Mirror, What's Hot in 2022 *