Alison Espach‘s novel The Wedding People was not only a New York Times bestseller and Best Book of the Year pick but it granted her finalist status for the 2026 Thurber Prize for American Humor. During our talk, she described learning of the nomination via an excited text from her agent during maternity leave and she schools me on how to tell if something is funny (does it amuse you?)
But Espach also looks to other authors for examples of great humor, like Lorrie Moore’s Self-Help and Madeleine Gray’s Green Dot, both of which made her laugh out loud.
Listen in to learn more about how Espach was able to turn a “ soul crushing” job in market research into the Audible Original In-Depth Market Research Interviews with Dead People. In this, she imagines the dead as chatty and obsessive, derailing strict product questions with their unresolved life stories.
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