A magnificent thrill; it is also a tale of character, for every member of the little ship's company is worth meeting. A book that should not be missed

No other writer has brought to fiction of this type quite the same lively sympathy and warmth of imagination or left so engaging an impression of truthfulness....Mr Shute always has good things to offer...the power to convey the springs of heroic conduct in the lightest and least assuming of tones

Based around a group aboard a converted trawler in 1942, this is a grand tale of sacrifice and courage and superbly structured

Real and heartfelt... Hudson avoids the usual sentimental clichés and gives us, without a shred of hipster cynicism, the hope and tough warmth for which she has such a sharp eye

A gritty, tough, sweet , sad, funny story of urban survival. Recommended

A sympathetic coming-of-age tale and a valuable counterpoint to widespread social attitudes to women in poverty

Concurrently very funny and incredibly sad. The writing sizzles, and the words jump off the page as Hudson describes a world of fags, booze, bingo and worse. We watch our heroine Janie Ryan struggle through it all with humour and a will to survive. I was cheering her on all the way, and I'm sure you will, too

A laugh out loud read

Told with such an honest and engaging voice that you can’t help but turn the page

This is a remarkable debut novel of love and loyalty, of fierce passion and scabrous wit, full of characters whose broad vernacular is direct and expressive. This is about a culture with just as much right to be called British as that of middle-class suburbia

Refreshing originality… Hudson’s achievement is the creation of a strong, working-class, female voice in her protagonist – filling a hole in contemporary literature

Definitely one to watch

Hudson’s ear for language…raises this debut novel well above the average

Janie’s irrepressible, childish glee and the sly humour into which it evolves give the novel a wry self-awareness that is both refreshing and endearing

A gripping, often hilarious tale of growing up in the slums of Aberdeen. Hard to put down owing to the power of the narrative, its DNA is part Roddy Doyle/part Irvine Welsh

[A] discomforting and acute tragicomedy ... The bleaker and darker his book becomes, the better it gets, building to a shocking and expertly executed conclusion. Tipped for the top on publication of his first novel, Lee here confirms his talent

For all painful events it covers, this is a joyful book. Lee educates us in the beautiful mess of humanity surrounding this tragic event. Joy is one of the best new novels this year.

A black comedy of exuberance and bite … original, and brilliantly executed; the characters’ voices … ventriloquised with flair … This is the wittiest, most addictive piece of literary yuppie-bashing since Martin Amis’s Money. Lee is a writer to keep an eye on.

A major new voice in British fiction.

A brilliant book... Jonathan Lee is one of those rare, agile writers who can take your breath away.

[Joy] displays a real flair for narrative and characterisation…Highly accomplished…The closest comparison that can be made is with Joshua Ferris’s Then We Came to the End, which shares a similarly bravura command of narrative voice…Exquisitely and surprisingly written…it proves that Lee is a significant talent and that his future work should be well worth awaiting.

Lee’s writing is witty and engaging, containing something of the wearied disgust of Raymond Chandler’s prose…These four voices confiding in the counsellor are entertainingly distinct…The novel’s outstanding achievement, however, is the central, spiralling narrative that Jonathan Lee threads among these personal accounts: the intimate story of how Joy came to fall, a forensic portrayal of despair that shows Lee to be an exceptional, brave prose stylist. The dark revelations in the book’s final pages are disturbing while not gratuitous, but Lee also allows some credible room for optimism among these cluttered lives. Funny and humane, Joy is an enormously impressive piece of storytelling

Lee's the real deal - a British writer on the cusp of greatness. This novel follows the aftermath of lawyer Joy Stephen's apparent suicide. The corporate and personal explode in a brilliant powerful dissection of modern Britain.

Jonathan Lee’s second novel, Joy charts the final day in the life of a high-flying young lawyer. Lee writes with extraordinary vividness, with prose so sharply defined it takes your breath away.

With its supple prose, ingenious structure, wit and slow-burn sympathy, Joy is a sly miracle of a novel.

[One] of Britain’s most exciting writers… I loved how Jonathan Lee’s Joy gradually unravels through different characters…The ending of Joy is brilliantly shocking. I finished it three weeks ago and it’s still playing on my mind… Something about Joy’s slow and brooding story really affected me…Lee manages to make every voice distinct…It is Joy’s complexity which keeps you reading…[A] wonderful book.

Lee constructs office scenes easily, weaving together numerous characters and dialogues with flair…the writing crackles.