The Commitments

The Commitments, The Snapper and The Van are possibly the funniest and warmest books I know. I love Nick Hornby, but his work is shallow and artificial compared to Doyle's. Roddie Doyle thinks up people - Irish people - so warm, so real, so alive - so contradictory, so foolish that you have to like them. Also, they are very working class. Interesting.

Above all, his dialogues are incomparable. Beautiful and witty and again: realistic.