Sorrow and Bliss: the instant Sunday Times bestseller Audible Audiobook – Unabridged

Meg Mason (Author), Hannah Monson (Narrator), HarperAudio (Publisher)

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Spiky, sharp, intriguingly dark and tender, full of pathos, fury and wit, Sorrow and Bliss by Meg Mason is a dazzling, distinctive novel from a boldly talented writer. For fans of Sally Rooney, Taffy Brodesser-Akner and Fleabag.

This novel is about a woman called Martha. She knows there is something wrong with her, but she doesn't know what it is. Her husband Patrick thinks she is fine. He says everyone has something, the thing is just to keep going.

Martha told Patrick before they got married that she didn't want to have children. He said he didn't mind either way because he has loved her since he was fourteen and making her happy is all that matters, although he does not seem able to do it.

By the time Martha finds out what is wrong, it doesn't really matter anymore. It is too late to get the only thing she has ever wanted. Or maybe it will turn out that you can stop loving someone and start again from nothing—if you can find something else to want.

The book is set in London and Oxford. It is sad and funny.

Listening Length

8 hours and 59 minutes
Author

Meg Mason
Narrator

Hannah Monson
Audible release date

21 September 2020
Language

English
Publisher

HarperAudio
ASIN

B086D8QBNB
Version

Unabridged
Program Type

Audiobook
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Product details

Listening Length	8 hours and 59 minutes
Author	Meg Mason
Narrator	Hannah Monson
Whispersync for Voice	Ready
Audible.com.au Release Date	21 September 2020
Publisher	HarperAudio
Program Type	Audiobook
Version	Unabridged
Language	English
ASIN	B086D8QBNB
Best Sellers Rank	335 in Audible Books & Originals (See Top 100 in Audible Books & Originals) 3 in Dark Humour Literature & Fiction 5 in Coming of Age Fiction (Audible Books & Originals) 6 in Dark Humour

Customer reviews

5 star		47%
4 star		34%
3 star		15%
2 star		3%
1 star		1%

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Top reviews from Australia

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Rachel Fogharty

Slow burning awesomeness

Reviewed in Australia on 1 January 2021

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I picked this book up & started it a couple of times thinking it was too melancholic to become entertaining - maybe that says more about me than the book!! But the writing is beautiful & the torment was so well written that I read the last 3/4 in an afternoon & was left wanting much more. A beautiful story with many, many laugh out loud moments in amongst the pain. I loved it & am going to immediately look for more Meg Mason books :)

4 people found this helpful

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Helen Taylor

Depressing & confusing

Reviewed in Australia on 9 February 2021

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For me, this book, supposedly written by someone with a severe & hereditary mental illness, makes a sad and disturbing book. I would not recommend it to anyone I know.

2 people found this helpful

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Kerstin Pilz

Loved it!

Reviewed in Australia on 18 May 2021

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I was hooked on Meg's clever, yet not too clever, writing style from the first page and couldn't put this book down. I loved how the story developed and the odd mix of characters.
As the title implies, this book keeps a fine balance between the tragic and the comic, sorrow and bliss. Profound, heartfelt without being saccharine, raw and punchy.
Read it in one go on the weekend, best weekend-read in a long time!

One person found this helpful

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Amazon Customer

Don't believe the hype

Reviewed in Australia on 2 April 2021

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I didn't enjoy this book. Why make a big deal about getting a diagnosis but then call it - -. It just interrupted the flow when I was reading it.

2 people found this helpful

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golden ears11

What a ride

Reviewed in Australia on 25 July 2021

Verified Purchase

This book was too close to the bone for me and really affected my mental health . Perhaps i should not have continued but pleased i did as i saw some light at the end of the tunnel i am hoping there will be some for me too.

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Susan Kristensen

Good read

Reviewed in Australia on 2 December 2020

Verified Purchase

Was a good read and kept me interested. The emotional, relationship aspect felt real. The medical condition, not being a real one, was a bit of a stretch for me coming from a medical education. I enjoyed the contemporary subject matter.

One person found this helpful

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Amazon Customer

Shines a light on how mental health disorders can impact on family and relationships

Reviewed in Australia on 8 May 2021

Verified Purchase

I really enjoyed the book. Written in a very distinctive style, it drew me in and I empathised with the character and her struggles to deal with her mental health, sense of identity and relationships with family and partners. I enjoyed the twist, and the way the story came together at the end. But beware: we read it for book club and it polarised the group. Led to some great discussions, though!

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annie bainger

Infuriating, but strangely compelling.

Reviewed in Australia on 10 May 2021

Verified Purchase

This woman made me clench my teeth at her self indulgence and self destructiveness, but slowly I found myself wanting her to unravel the weirdness and find some peace. Happily the conversations with family members towards the end were not too maudlin or schmaltzy, so it ended with some grace.

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Top reviews from other countries

Rosy

Pointless and offensive to people who suffer from psychiatric illnesses

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 28 July 2021

Verified Purchase

As the note at the end of the book states; the medical symptoms described in this book are not consistent with a genuine mental illness and the portrayal of the treatment is wholly fictional. In other words, the author wanted to write a book about something she knew nothing about and wasn't bothered with doing any research on the subject. It is a false, inaccurate portrayal of psychiatric illness. To just make this kind of stuff up is actually deeply offensive to people who do suffer from a "genuine" mental illness. There are many existing books on this topic - deeply moving, beautifully written accounts of psychiatric illness and treatment - that are authentic and sometimes semi-autobiographical (some of which clearly provided the inspiration for this book), so why bother to write a book about a made up illness when you clearly have no clue what you're talking about? This book made me upset and angry. If you have any experience with psychiatric illness you will recognise immediately that the author has pulled all of this out of her ar$e and if you haven't, what you are getting is a load of nonsense that has no basis in reality. Either way, I don't recommend it.

179 people found this helpful

The Doctor46

Repetitive. No basis in actual mental illness diagnosis

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 14 June 2021

Verified Purchase

An afterword states that this is not based on actual mental illness knowledge. Hence she receives a diagnosis of __ __. Nonsense. Whining self centered main character with a passive husband that would not exist. 100 pages too long.

120 people found this helpful

karen SWAN

More sorrow than bliss

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 9 June 2021

Verified Purchase

Quite tedious for much of the book, it's like being an unwitting psychiatrist, hour after hour of outpouring of angst that we all have to deal with in our lives. No fun and not funny at all which was disappointing.

110 people found this helpful

Octipuss prime

Dull and Over-Hyped

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 28 June 2021

Verified Purchase

I know I am in a minority but this wasn't for me. The protagonist, Martha, has some kind of mental illness (which annoyingly is never named even when it is finally diagnosed - because, as the author admits, she made it up) and this gives her licence to be utterly obnoxious and self-centred particularly to the childhood friend who is foolish enough to marry her when her first ill-conceived marriage fails. The story is pretty thin and although there are a few funny lines by the end, I was so sick of Martha's whinging that it was a pleasure to finish.

93 people found this helpful

Charles Pargeter

What a Copout

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 4 July 2021

Verified Purchase

This is a well-written book tackling the subject of mental illness. It shows how the disease not only affects the sufferer but also their family and other people they come in contact with. The book does, however, contain one massive flaw. For the purposes of her plot, the author invents an unnamed mental condition which can be cured by one course of medication. Not only does this unfairly raise the hopes of undiagnosed mental health sufferers, it is also a massive copout in terms of the novel's plotting. The narrator immediately becomes not only unreliable but untrustworthy. A decent editor would not have allowed Meg Mason to build an entire novel about such a blatant act of narrative cheating.

64 people found this helpful

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Sorrow and Bliss: the instant Sunday Times bestseller Audible Audiobook – Unabridged

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