Haig was 46 last Saturday. For his first 40 years, life was a struggle. In many ways, it is still a struggle – he has anxiety and tinnitus and says he is always alert to the danger of depression returning – but at least now he is riding the crest of a wave of commercial success. The Comfort Book is a collection of consolations learned in hard times and suggestions for making the bad days better. Drawing on maxims, memoir and the inspirational lives of others, these meditations offer new ways of seeing ourselves and the world. This is an A to Z glossary of terms defining the human race, as written by an alien, covering politics, food, biology and many more subjects. The humour in this book is excellent: it's really funny and very well written, and the fact that it's from an alien's perspective is really effective. An objective view of a lot of things that we take for granted everyday works really well, and although there's a lot of humour here, the observation that humans have hope, and how powerful this is, is really lovely. In his newest book The Radleys (2010) , an intelligently conceived tale of a family of vampires attempting to live incognito in suburbia, Haig further explores the consequences of suppression in the context of the nuclear family. Teenagers Rowan and Clara are unaware of their heritage until a bloody killing forces the family to take action. While the rotating viewpoint tends to diminish reader engagement, plotting remains tight and Haig’s ideas – such as ‘An Abstainer’s Glossary’ which explains vampire terms – fresh. Philip Noble is an eleven-year-old in crisis. His pub landlord father has died in a road accident, and his mother is succumbing to the greasy charms of her dead husband’s brother, Uncle Alan. The remaining certainties of Philip’s life crumble away when his father’s ghost appears in the pub and declares Uncle Alan murdered him.

Humans: An A to Z by Matt Haig | Goodreads Humans: An A to Z by Matt Haig | Goodreads

From the publication of his first novel in 2004, Matt Haig has enjoyed popular success with his fiction for adults and children, including crossover hits.As a novelist, you are absolved from responsibility and you’re not very good at taking it on. There was a little moment when I would have pressed a button not to have written it. Certainly not now, because I’ve come to terms with it, but there was a time when it was a bit too much.” An earth dwelling animal,a domesticated and multi purpose ungulate,which humans treat as a one stop shop for food,liquid refreshment,fertiliser and designer foot wear.

Humans: An A-Z - Matt Haig Humans: An A-Z - Matt Haig

The United Kingdom's international organisation for cultural relations and educational opportunities.It's harder and harder to get to that place of creative freedom where you think: 'If I was just starting out now and this was the first thing I'd ever put out, what would it be?' Ik vond het zo jammer dat ik De wezens uit had, want toen was er niets meer met die exacte geniale vorm van humor.

The Humans by Matt Haig | Waterstones

Matt Haig books consist of both fiction and non fiction, and he has written for children as well as adults. I will for ever have to be mindful of my mental health,” he says. “I can’t take my eye off the ball. But I’m definitely in a very grateful place. I never say I’m a happy person, because that’s almost like saying you’re a sad person. It fixes you as that thing and imposes certain expectations. I try to be open to everything.

The book is hilarious but also sad. I'm really wondering if that's what an alien would see, learn and comprehend about us and our planet? His multi-award winning popular first novel for children, Shadow Forest, was published in 2007 and its sequel, The Runaway Troll, in 2009. Since then he has written To Be A Cat (2013); Echo Boy (2014) and A Boy Called Christmas (2015) with illustrations by Chris Mould. A Boy Called Christmas has been made into a film that will be released this year – just before Christmas, naturally – while a film of his 2017 novel How to Stop Time is being developed by Benedict Cumberbatch’s production company.