Exploring the challenge of balancing the lives we lead in the real world and online through a story of young Dublin students, this sharp, smart debut mines the uncertainty and absurdity of being alive today in unputdownable prose.
Dublin student life is ending for Sophie and her friends. They've got everything figured out, and Sophie feels left behind as they all start to go their separate ways. She's overshadowed by her best friend Grace. She's been in love with Finn for as long as she's known him. And she's about to meet Rory, who's suddenly available to her online.
At a party, what was already unstable completely falls apart and Sophie finds herself obsessively scrolling social media, waiting for something (anything) to happen.
None of This Is Serious is about the uncertainty and absurdity of being alive today. It's about balancing the real world with the online, and the vulnerabilities in yourself, your relationships, your body. At its heart, this is a novel about the friendships strong enough to withstand anything.
Publisher: Canongate Books
ISBN: 9781838855529
Number of pages: 288
Weight: 283 g
Dimensions: 214 x 135 x 21 mm
Edition: Main
An extraordinary novel. None of This Is Serious brilliantly explores the impossibility to "come of age" in end times, where screens are so contiguous to experience that no-one is ever truly online or offline. She writes truthfully and with affectless nuance about the labyrinthine workings of friend groups and the defences women scramble for in a world that still hates us - NAOISE DOLAN, author of EXCITING TIMES
I inhaled None of This Is Serious. I've been waiting for a fictional story that reflects the all-consuming influence that the Internet has on my life. None of This Is Serious is that story. A compulsively readable, fresh and painfully accurate description of the way we live now. Don't let the title fool you. It is serious. Seriously good - LOUISE NEALON, author of SNOWFLAKE
Edgy . . . [Prasifka] has a painfully raw and acute gift for catching the way things are - Sunday Times
I absolutely LOVED this novel. Beautifully crafted - EMMA GANNON, author of OLIVE
Fortunately, [Prasifka] doesn't need any sprinkling of Rooney's fairy dust; she makes her own magic. In the seriously good None of This is Serious, the 26-year-old author conveys what it's like to be a young woman today navigating life in Dublin and online . . . She is an astute observer of the social dynamics of her generation - Irish Times
A beautifully written original take on how we're all guilty of taking refuge online as the world around us becomes increasingly confusing - Stylist, Fiction Books You Can't Miss in 2022
[A] funny, endearingly heartfelt debut - Daily Mail
As we adapt to our increasingly online lives, Catherine Prasifka's debut is the antidote we never knew we needed. We meet Sophie, Prasifka's ultra-relatable protagonist, at a precarious time in her life: leaving university. What happens next is a worthy reminder that Instagram /= reality - Glamour, Best Books of 2022
None of This Is Serious is brilliant - so devastatingly precise about being a young woman living in Ireland and online today, moving deftly between sharp, hilarious observations and heartbreaking, enraging moments - CLAIRE HENNESSY, author of LIKE OTHER GIRLS
None of This Is Serious is such a compelling novel, and Sophie is such a relatable character - reading her story felt like one of those meaningful and immersive conversations you can only have with a stranger at 3am in the toilets of a dingy club, all hearts laid bare. At times agonisingly close to the bone, Catherine Prasifka's debut novel is an exquisitely unnerving portrayal of who we are and how we live - KATIE HALE, author of MY NAME IS MONSTER
Sophie, our protagonist, has just finished college in Dublin, and is faced with the sobering reality of adult life as a 20-something, insecure, unemployed person watching her friends succeed. Obsessively scrolling... More
A profound exploration into the effects of social media on modern friendships and relationships, with a fantastical twist, Prasifka’s debut is an outstanding debut. Deeply moving and unique in its take on agency in... More
There are a lot of links being made between Catherine Prasifka and other female Irish writers like Sally Rooney, Naoise Dolan and Louise Nealon, which are all pretty inevitable. I don't think any young female... More
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