Sophie McManus

Sophie McManus, whose writing reminds me of Anne Tyler or Jonathan Franzen ... shows us the world through the cloudy lens of the truly moneyed, and gives us a riveting sense that something horrible is about to happen to these people. She corrals our prurience beautifully.

McManus renders her opulent protagonists sympathetic by investigating their family ‘values’ with wit and generosity

McManus, with her intricate re-creation of CeCe’s regal life, hearkens to an earlier artist far less frequently invoked: Edith Wharton . . . some of the funniest writing I’ve read in years: Martin Amis funny; wheezing, choke-on-your-laughter funny. After reading so many comic novels that eventually shatter in brittle cynicism or evaporate in gassy sentimentality, I moved through <i>The</i> <i>Unfortunates</i> with a slowly accruing sense of awe as these characters grew simultaneously more outrageous and more sympathetic.

A truly dexterous writer, one who eyes the insular world she has chosen to crack open for us with as much wisdom as wit…formidable gifts for social satire

Reads as a cross between Tom Wolfe and Brett Easton Ellis at their respective peaks

The Unfortunates is both a mirror on the income inequality of the current moment and a social novel in the old, grand, plotty mode: voracious for detail and punctuated by gasp-inducing turns of fate.  Its subjects are money and the people unfortunate enough to have it.  Who knew the rich deserved so much to be pitied?

What is truly rich about this stunning debut novel, beyond the over privileged social class in question, is the brilliant language—lucid, quick, accessible, yet almost cubist in its syntactical swerves and surprising word choices—with which Sophie McManus invests the inner lives of the Somners, mother, son, and daughter-in-law – three unforgettable protagonists.

In finely etched detail as sharp as shards of glass, McManus reveals the corrupting power of wealth and the myriad ways it infects individual lives, and families.As relevant as it is compulsively readable.

Is there anything Sophie McManus can’t do? The virtuosity in these pages is astonishing, but just as astonishing is this novel’s abiding heart.

Joshua Henkin, author of THE WORLD WITHOUT YOU

Sophie McManus has a shrewd eye for telling gestures and an ear for cruel speech and kindness.She is an incisive, surprising prose stylist, and her debut novel, The Unfortunates, heralds an exciting new talent with an old soul.

Christine Schutt, author of PROPSEROUS FRIENDS

CeCe Somner, an eccentric heiress once known for her cruel wit as much as for her tremendous generosity, now faces opulent decline. Afflicted with a rare disease and touched by mortality for the first time, her gilded, bygone values collide with an unforgiving present. As her troubled, spoiled son George and his outsider wife Iris struggle to resolve mounting financial and familiar troubles, Cece must face the Somner dynasty’s dark legacy. But when George’s secrets culminate in an unexpected crime, no riches can put things right for the unfortunate Somners. What will become of all three, who must learn what life will be like beyond the long, shimmering shadow cast by the family’s past?

Sophie McManus

Praise for The Unfortunates

Sophie McManus, whose writing reminds me of Anne Tyler or Jonathan Franzen ... shows us the world through the cloudy lens of the truly moneyed, and gives us a riveting sense that something horrible is about to happe ...

McManus renders her opulent protagonists sympathetic by investigating their family ‘values’ with wit and generosity

A very sharp novel

Sophie McManus, whose writing reminds me of Anne Tyler or Jonathan Franzen ... shows us the world through the cloudy lens of the truly moneyed, and gives us a riveting sense that something horrible is about to happe ...

McManus renders her opulent protagonists sympathetic by investigating their family ‘values’ with wit and generosity

A very sharp novel

Sophie McManus, whose writing reminds me of Anne Tyler or Jonathan Franzen ... shows us the world through the cloudy lens of the truly moneyed, and gives us a riveting sense that something horrible is about to happe ...

McManus renders her opulent protagonists sympathetic by investigating their family ‘values’ with wit and generosity

A very sharp novel

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