Showing results by publisher "Picador" in Dark Humour

Helen, a graduate student on a quest to save the planet, is one of the best minds of her generation. But when her irreplaceable advisor’s student sex scandal is exposed, she must choose whether to give up on her work or accompany him to RIP, a research institute which grants safe harbour to the disgraced and the deplorable. As Helen settles into life at the institute alongside her partner Hew, she develops a crush on an older novelist, while he is drawn to an increasingly violent protest movement.

When I was a child, I loved old men, and I could tell that they also loved me. And so we meet our deliciously incisive narrator: a popular English professor whose husband, a charismatic professor at the same small liberal arts college, is under investigation for his inappropriate relationships with his former students. The couple have long had a mutual understanding when it comes to their extramarital pursuits, but with these new allegations, life has become far less comfortable for them both.

Seventh Seltzer has done everything he can to break from the traditions of the past, but in his overbearing, narcissistic mother’s last moments, she whispers in his ear the two words he always knew she would: ‘Eat me’. This is not unusual, as the Seltzers are Cannibal Americans, a once proud and thriving ethnic group, but for Seventh, it raises some serious questions. Of practical concern, she’s six-foot-two and weighs over 30 stone - even divided up between Seventh and his 11 brothers, that's a lot of red meat. Plus Second keeps kosher, Ninth is vegan and Sixth is dead.

Meet Drew Lord Haig, called upon to sing the obscure hit from his youth at a paramilitary event. Or Max, who recalls an eventful journey to a Christian film festival. Meet Mrs Dallesandro, in the tanning salon on her wedding anniversary dreaming of a teenage sexual experience. And Sonya, who scours the streets of Belfast for the missing posters of her dead son. In Dance Move, the new collection of stories from Wendy Erskine, we meet characters who are looking to wrest control of their lives, only to find themselves defined by the moment in their past that marked them.

Set in the author’s native Belfast, the ten stories in Sweet Home lay bare the heartbreak and quiet tragedies that run under the surface of everyday lives. A lonely woman is fascinated by her niqab-wearing neighbours; a middle-aged teacher becomes obsessed with a young Gaelic football player; and an employer covers for his two employees caught having sex in a public toilet.

Amelia is no stranger to sex and death. Her job in her family’s funeral parlour, doing make-up on the dead, might be unusual, but she’s good at it. Life and warmth comes from the men she meets online - combining with someone else’s body at night in order to become something else, at least for a while. But when a sudden loss severs her ties with someone she loves, Amelia sets off on a 72-hour mission to outrun her grief - skipping out on the funeral, running away to stay with her father in Tasmania and experimenting on the local BDSM scene.