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AudioBook information:
Author: Claire Carusillo
Narrated by: Zura Johnson
Release date: August 11, 2026
Audiobook Duration: 11 h 32 min
Summary: A rollicking, “unsinkable,” (Sam Lipsyte) and hilarious debut novel about a family of unforgettable women obsessed with securing their legacy, for fans of Geek Love
Claire grew up with the legend of the Unsinkable Mounsey Women. Her great-great-grandmother Fanny made headlines in 1915 for washing ashore in England nearly a year after her ship sank. Fanny’s daughter Sarah went to collect her mother on the equally ill-fated Lusitania—whose sinking she, too, survived. Their improbable endurance led to regional stardom on the Midwestern vaudeville circuit. But Claire never knew the full story—until now.
Listless, jobless, and recently canceled for extolling skin-care advice online that sent a reader to the hospital, Claire is surprised when a knock at the door turns out to be the police, looking for answers about a murder from the 1970s they suspect her mother, Kath, may know something about. As the cops zero in, Claire demands answers from her mother.
Kath’s comically long response, which blossoms into the story of the Mounseys and their descendants writ large, moves from a Liverpudlian poorhouse at the onset of World War I to a Lake Michigan lighthouse in 1971 (when sex was freer and McDonald’s fried their potatoes with beef tallow) to present-day Chicagoland; along the way, it offers Claire a richer understanding of what she inherited from the complicated, resilient women she descends from.
Replete with inappropriately old boyfriends, dubious medical professionals, and more than a few boats, The Responsible Party is the story of several women, in several different timelines, trying to stay afloat.
Reviews:
Named one of the Best New Novels to Read on the Beach This Summer by Harper’s Bazaar
“A terrifically comic debut novel . . . succeeds by way of its outlandish story line as much as by its singular voice. . . . Carusillo is a master of the vigorous and inclusive aside, employing a crackling blend of high and low diction. . . . Affirms that we can’t necessarily escape the conduct of our predecessors, while gleefully celebrating, one smashing sentence at a time, that there’s alchemy to be found in the hands of the right legatee.”
―The New York Times
“A pleasurably busy and delightfully odd debut. . . . Intelligent, often hilarious, and teeming with stories and backstories.”
―Vulture
“A hilarious debut. . . . full of sharp satire and messy family dynamics; a maximalist story of dysfunction and legacy.”
―Chicago Review of Books, “12 Must-Read Books of August”
“Gripping and funny, Carusillo unravels mysteries long buried with precise pacing and dialogue. This is a Hollywood-ready story―a complete knockout.”
―Debutiful, Most Anticipated Books of 2026
“Carusillo juggles the many plot threads with aplomb and proves to be a consummate prose stylist. This one has energy and ambition to spare.”
―Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“Claire Carusillo is a clear force, a real, true talent that is surely here to stay: The Responsible Party is just the first stop on her epic writer’s journey. Everyone just needs to hop on board.”
―Literary Hub, 19 Novels You Need to Read This Summer
“An unruly and comic debut.”
―Booklist
“Brilliant, saucy, and addictive, Carusillo’s debut has smarts and wildness to spare, heart and speed, too. To read this book is to have your ears blown back, the sheer, powerful wind of it woke me up, and had me thinking for the first time in a long while, wow, this is what fiction can do.”
―Heidi Julavits, author of Directions to Myself and The Folded Clock
“Family dysfunction and inherited trauma have rarely gotten such rich, off-beat, searingly funny treatment. Claire Carusillo is a juggernaut of comic invention and her novel teems with dark wit and feeling. This debut is unsinkable.”
―Sam Lipsyte, author of Home Land, The Ask, and No One Left to Come Looking for You
“Your poor hatches ― there is simply no way to batten them for the utter brilliance of Claire Carusillo’s debut. The Responsible Party mesmerizes: chockablock with feats of storytelling, helmed by foremothers who won’t be messed with. Virtuosic, jaunty, and exuberant, this book is the work of a dynamic comic genius.”
―C. Luchette, author of Agatha of Little Neon
“Readers, pay attention: Claire Carusillo is a true original! Sentence by sentence, The Responsible Party bends every genre―autofiction, murder mystery, coming of age story, multi-generational novel, you name it, it’s all here, from shipwreck to vaudeville―in this fantastically joyous ruckus of a debut.”
―Victoria Redel, author of I Am You
“Claire Carusillo is the funniest person alive, and her ancestresses are the funniest people dead, and The Responsible Party is better than perfect: a raucous, astonishingly original novel about ambition, legacy, and the plight of womankind written with unmatched tenacity and bombastic glee. All at once grand and fearless and intimate and precise, this is a symphony and a major debut. I’ve never read anything like it.”
―Alexandra Tanner, author of Worry
About the Author:
Claire Carusillo is a writer from Illinois. She now lives in Midway, Utah, where she co-owns Storyboard, a bookstore, skate shop, and coffee bar. She has an MFA in fiction from Columbia University, where she was a teaching fellow. Her writing has appeared all over the internet, including in Gawker, New York, Elle, and her newsletter, That Wet Look.