Poppy Shakespeare by Clare Allan

Poppy Shakespeare

Clare Allan

Acutely perceptive, unsentimental and extremely funny, this surreal (at least partly) take on modern mental-health care deserves to sell thousands of copies, and to do for that care what 'Catch 22' did for the armed forces. Worth reading for the chapter headings alone - check out number 38 - but for so much more as well.

Extract
Weren't every dribbler was convinced the doctors knew their business, but the more Rosetta kept saying they did the more the doubts crawled in. And the flops as well, you could see in their faces, even the ones that was so drugged up they looked like they been whizzed in a blender and poured back into their bodies; you seen their eyebrows twist into frowns as one by one they realised what had happened.
Parallels
  • Broken Biscuits by Liz Kettle
  • The Restraint of Beasts by Magnus Mills
  • Vernon God Little by D C H Pierre