All My Puny Sorrows by Miriam Toews, 5/5

All my words are insufficient to convey how exquisite this semi-autobiographical novel is; I am reduced to a string of mere adjectives…raw, beautiful, funny, insightful, uplifting, bittersweet…none of which can fully capture this story of two sisters, one a struggling writer with a history of failed relationships and the other a beautiful concert pianist who possesses everything happiness requires…except the will to live.  Intensely personal, defiantly human, undeniably humorous, this book is a masterpiece and a privilege to read.

Why I read it: The first chapter is in McSweeney’s No. 48.