None of This Is Serious: Catherine Prasifka

Product Information

I flit between social bubbles, each one with a slightly different rhythm. The girls I know from school are the same as always, each personality moving against the others in a well-practised dance. They welcome me into their group, but I have nothing to say to them. Niamh asks me, ‘What are you up to now?’ as though we’ve not spoken in months, and I remember that we haven’t. I wonder at what point I became an outsider and if it’s their fault or mine. They don’t try to convince me to stay when I stand up and mumble an excuse; they are too engrossed in each other’s lives. 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’ Opening sentence: The taxi splashes water over the pavement as it pulls up to the the house. A lot of themes at play At times I did feel like the book dragged on and it was repetitive in some sections. Sophie’s reliance on social media was very evident through out the novel but I found the author went into a lot of detail and it did not do much for the plot. The style in which the book was written was confusing to me. It was not always clear to me when Sophie was responding to someone or just thinking. The author uses quotation marks for the other characters but not for Sophie. It worked for most of the book as I did not notice this at first but then there were some sections of the book that were confusing to me.

None of This Is Serious by Catherine Prasifka | Goodreads

If there was ever a book that made you want to switch off your phone, it’s this one. That feeling of constantly being online, being beholden to messaging apps and social media, is starkly felt throughout this book. 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. Then, at a party, what was already unstable completely falls apart and Sophie finds herself obsessively scrolling social media, waiting for something (anything) to happen. With the constant hate that Sophie purports for herself, it is not inconceivable to see her pursue relationships with people with whom she might be better off without. Within the opening chapter of this book, I became intrigued by Sophie’s character & wanted to see her experience a happy existence. It was troubling to see her forgive Finn for his disconnect because that is what she is familiar with experiencing. I applaud the author here once again for rendering these invisible relationships so accurate, so real. Every character within this story was as authentic as the people we walk alongside every single day.

Advance Praise

Catherine Prasifka, as it happens, is the sister-in-law of the author-who-shall-not-be-named. A standing ovation, then, to her and her publicity team for admirably resisting the temptation to ask Rooney for a blurb or even mentioning the connection in the marketing materials of Prasifka’s debut novel. None of this is Serious is a celebration of just how wonderful the world is but also just how strange modern life can really be. Delving into the amazing truth of having worldwide connection at your fingertips - but the dangers that come with it too. The mental anguish that seeing polished, curated social media feeds can cause and of course how easily the internet can become a rumour mill. In None of this is Serious we meet Sophie. A 22-year-old University graduate who is job hunting, living at home with her parents in Dublin, feels more at ease in the cyber world than the real one and is more than a little lost. She spends an inordinate amount of time online – she has a true addiction: The two major themes in this book are climate change and the level of disconnect we all have, which in turn connect with the less-prominent themes of toxic masculinity, sibling rivalry, fat phobia, consent, friendship, financial worries, and more. I think everything was explored in-depth throughout the book, and it really speaks to our times and the state of the world.

None of This Is Serious: familiar but different – The Irish Times None of This Is Serious: familiar but different – The Irish Times

I take a gulp of wine straight from the bottle and angle my face so I’m visible from the hallway. I picture the scene from the outside and imagine I look like a regular girl having a good time, and it fills me with delight.

Featured Reviews

I refresh the feed every minute and continue to consume, growing fat. I’m like a vampire, leeching off the content of other people’s lives. I’m not even really interested in anything I’m reading.” There’s a bit of anti-British sentiment in places and I cringed reading it. It feels as though it was written by someone who has never left Ireland. Exciting Times featured this too.