Ordinary Human Failings

Nolan is the real deal

The Times

The millennial author everyone should be watching right now

Daily Telegraph

Heartbreaking, society-examining stuff

Vogue

A fearless writer... Marks a confident evolution in her writing

Bookseller

Megan Nolan is one of the brightest young things around

The Times, *Summer Reads of 2023*

A brilliant analysis of what happens when we treat horror and pain as entertainment. Nolan writes with great compassion

Nicole Flattery, author of Nothing Special

There is something wonderfully ordinary about this book... Nolan has set out to make a plain three-legged stool rather than an ornate grandfather clock. The corridors of contemporary literature are stuffed with grandfather clocks with faulty mechanisms. How much more valuable is this modest, well-made thing

Sunday Times

Page-turning and written with aching, compassionate insight. Each account leaves your heartstrings taut as cheese wire

Observer

As much of a compulsive read as the first novel

The Times

Ordinary Human Failings is something as rare as a chilling, ice cold, bruising novel not shying from the darkest aspects of humanity, at the same time as being compassionate, aching and ultimately hopeful. I inhaled it, and its characters will stay with me for a long long time. Oh she sure can write that Nolan

Jenny Mustard, author of Okay Days

One masterful novel... Nolan has excelled herself: Ordinary Human Failings is a raw, pulsing thing... A writer who's still at the start of what promises to be a splendid career. Ordinary Human Failings is a bold and beautiful second novel... daring in all the right ways, but compassionate when it needs to be

Daily Telegraph

A feat of narrative compression that showcases Nolan's talent

Daily Mail

A subtle, accomplished and lyrical study of familial and intergenerational despair, a quiet book about quiet lives... An excellent novel: politically astute, furious and compassionate... A genuine achievement

Guardian

The final pages...moved me to tears. This is a fine novel by an author who, at just thirty-three, already has exceptional skill and nerve

Literary Review

Megan Nolan's debut novel saw her grouped with other Irish millennial women such as Sally Rooney and Naoise Dolan. But with her ambitious and insightful second novel, Ordinary Human Failings, Nolan makes it clear she is not a manifestation of a type, but rather a writer to be read on her own terms

Financial Times

An ambitious novel, and the story is told beautifully

Independent

A heartbreaking study in how humiliation and grief are passed from parent to child

Daily Telegraph, *Summer Reads of 2023*

Nolan's prose is cool, elegant and, at times, stunningly beautiful

Dazed

The narrative never lets up, with brilliantly conceived and achieved set-pieces

Critic

Addiction, teenage pregnancy and heartbreak fuel this pacey, poignant novel

The Times, *Books of the Year*

Nolan has crafted a novel full of brutal, illuminating truths

Sunday Times, *Books of the Year*

Ambitious and original… I loved its humanity and generosity… I can’t wait to read whatever comes next

DAVID NICHOLLS, author of One Day and You Are Here

Nolan’s novel is dark in subject, yet retains a tender faith in a person’s, or a family’s, capacity for change

New Statesman, *Books of the Year*

A novel of great humanity

London School of Economics, *Books of the Year*

Tightly written, full of wisdom, insight and sympathy – terrific!

CLARE CHAMBERS, author of Small Pleasures

Nolan switches deftly between perspectives in this sometimes nasty but compassionate novel

The Times, *Summer Reads of 2024*