No Happy Endings

A Memoir

By: Nora McInerny

Narrated by: Nora McInerny

The author of It’s Okay to Laugh and host of the popular podcast Terrible, Thanks for Asking—interviews that are “a gift to be able to listen [to]” (New York Times)—returns with more hilarious meditations on her messy, wonderful, bittersweet, and unconventional life.

Life has a million different ways to kick you right in the chops. We lose love, lose jobs, lose our sense of self. For Nora McInerny, it was losing her husband, her father, and her unborn second child in one catastrophic year.

But in the wake of loss, we get to assemble something new from whatever is left behind. Some circles call finding happiness after loss “Chapter 2”—the continuation of something else. Today, Nora is remarried and mothers four children aged 16 months to 16 years. While her new circumstances bring her extraordinary joy, they are also tinged with sadness over the loved ones she’s lost.

Life has made Nora a reluctant expert in hard conversations. On her wildly popular podcast, she talks about painful experiences we inevitably face, and exposes the absurdity of the question “how are you?” that people often ask when we’re coping with the aftermath of emotional catastrophe. She knows intimately that when your life falls apart, there’s a mad rush to be okay—to find a silver lining, to get to the happy ending. In this, her second memoir, Nora offers a tragicomic exploration of the tension between finding happiness and holding space for the unhappy experiences that have shaped us.

No Happy Endings is a book for people living life after life has fallen apart. It’s a book for people who know that they’re moving forward, not moving on. It’s a book for people who know life isn’t always happy, but it isn’t the end: there will be unimaginable joy and incomprehensible tragedy. As Nora reminds us, there will be no happy endings—but there will be new beginnings.

sweet and uplifting

I've been a fan of Nora's podcast for the last year, and this books is a bitter sweet taste of her creation. I wasn't expecting to feel empower and it is actually quite feminist.

Simple unmissable

Dear Nora,

Thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you.

Biggest of hugs,

Camila.

Amazing and soul touching

Thank you for sharing your talent and honesty. This book spoke to me softly and with self relief.

Just listen to it—you won’t regret it!

Nora has a way of telling stories. She makes you laugh, cry, and think all within a span of—however long this book is. She keeps you company while she does it. Just listen to it. You won’t regret it.

Just okay

Two words - Brene Brown. It was Nora's story, but it read like a Brene Brown talk. Nothing "wrong" with it; just not my cup of tea. Even the light moments came across heavy.