Paula Spencer by Roddy Doyle
(Vintage)

Putting her alcoholism behind her, Paula Spencer (who we first met in Doyle's brilliant 1996 novel, The Woman Who Walked Into Doors), is starting anew on the road to sobriety. This is Doyle's intimate and affecting portrait of a working-class Irish woman's journey as she struggles through her first year without booze.

Set eight years after she was first introduced to us, the book opens on Paula's 47th birthday. Her abusive and wild husband Charlo, is dead and the children are grown with children of their own. What comes next is a wonderful exploration of the everyday; Paula is dizzy with the regularity and normality of her new life. From having money in her pocket, to the occasional day off work, she is happy, tough and battling her demons.

Doyle uses his trademark narrative style, made up almost exclusively of dialogue and fragmented inner monologue, to convey the thousand tiny moments that make up Paula's despair and triumph. It's subtle and unsentimental, just as much as you'd expect from Doyle on form.