McKenna, Oisin - Happy Life

This makes no sense, he thought. Look at your wonderful life…'
Hackney, August 2023. Tommy skives off work early. He’s hungry for a little more pleasure before
summer is over. It’s a beautiful day, he’s surrounded by friends, and adored by his boyfriend, but as
the day hurries on, his life’s happiness becomes harder to grasp.
Thirty years earlier, Tommy lived as a child on these same streets with his father, Maxy, and his
mother, Gráinne, a nurse from County Roscommon who lost her own father at seven in
circumstances no one wants to talk about. Gráinne is funny, and kind, but her feelings are big and
unwieldy. She loves her little family, so why does she want to run away from it?
When the community gather for one final night at a beloved local bar closing its doors for good, the
loves of Tommy’s life wait for his arrival. But as the party escalates, Tommy still hasn’t arrived.
A story which sprawls across three generations, moving from the East End of London to the West of
Ireland, from queer bars and saunas, to bomb shelters during the Blitz, Happy Life is a profound and
moving portrait of people who love being alive, and can’t go on living.