Is This a Funny Story? (Paperback)
Language: English
Published by Sutherland House, 2026
- Softcover
- New
Seller: Grand Eagle Retail, Bensenville, IL, U.S.A.Grand Eagle Retail
AbeBooks seller since October 12, 2005
Condition: New
£ 16.94
Quantity: 1 available
Add to basketItem description from seller
Paperback. A darkly comic, posthumously published memoir about mortality, memory, and the messy business of being human.The telephone call makes her legs go weak and forces her to sit down: "The tests results from your biopsy came back. They're positive for malignancy."Ellen Vanstone, a writer and journalist of brilliance and biting wit, reacts by carrying on with what she's always done. Making notes. Putting it down on paper in an attempt to make sense of her new reality of drug trials, medical procedures and personal upheaval.There's also the past to be confronted. Unresolved issues with her siblings. The guilt and shame she still feels about breaking up with the father of her daughter decades earlier over a man who turned out to be the world's worst boyfriend. The chorus of imaginary enemies whispering, Ellen got this because she deserved it, with her reckless, job-quitting, peripatetic, party-smoking, binge-drinking, promiscuous ways.And ever the writer, she worries about what tone to take: "Should I aim for sad and profound? Or lighthearted and entertaining?" The memoir she came up with is all of those things and more: unforgettable, moving, and, of course, funny. Shipping may be from multiple locations in the US or from the UK, depending on stock availability.…
Seller Inventory # 9781997701590
- Title
- Is This a Funny Story? (Paperback)
- Author
- Ellen Vanstone
- Publisher
- Sutherland House
- Publication year
- 2026
- Condition
- new
- Binding
- Paperback
- Language
- English
- ISBN 10
- 1997701596
- ISBN 13
- 9781997701590
A darkly comic, posthumously published memoir about mortality, memory, and the messy business of being human.
The telephone call makes her legs go weak and forces her to sit down: "The tests results from your biopsy came back. They’re positive for malignancy."
Ellen Vanstone, a writer and journalist of brilliance and biting wit, reacts by carrying on with what she’s always done. Making notes. Putting it down on paper in an attempt to make sense of her new reality of drug trials, medical procedures and personal upheaval.
There’s also the past to be confronted. Unresolved issues with her siblings. The guilt and shame she still feels about breaking up with the father of her daughter decades earlier over a man who turned out to be the world’s worst boyfriend. The chorus of imaginary enemies whispering, Ellen got this because she deserved it, with her reckless, job-quitting, peripatetic, party-smoking, binge-drinking, promiscuous ways.
And ever the writer, she worries about what tone to take: "Should I aim for sad and profound? Or lighthearted and entertaining?" The memoir she came up with is all of those things and more: unforgettable, moving, and, of course, funny.
"Synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.
About the Author
Ellen Vanstone was born in Winnipeg, where she rowed with the Canoe Club and played volleyball at the University. She moved to Toronto to study journalism at Ryerson University (now TMU) and worked for every major newspaper and magazine, as an editor and a multiple-award-winning writer. In 1999, she embarked on a successful television writing career, cocreating the long-running Rookie Blue, as well as working on At The Hotel, Departure and Diggstown. In one of her last texts to her publisher in the fall of 2025, she said: “I would prefer ‘she died’ instead of ‘she passed.’”
"About the title" may belong to another edition of this title.
Grand Eagle Retail
Bensenville, IL, U.S.A.
AbeBooks seller since October 12, 2005
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