This is Zoë Heller’s third novel. Her previous book, Notes on a Scandal, was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize and I think this one’s even better. Set in Heller’s adoptive US, The Believers is a funny, highly original and adroit satire of New York’s liberal elite. The title, a wicked irony in itself, belies the books central characters, the Litvinoff tribe – a family of hard line antitheists who have rejected their Jewish heritage and proudly live by socialist values. The father, Joel, is a charismatic civil rights lawyer, his wife Audrey, a raging, pot-smoking ultra-leftist. Their façade is shattered when Joel suffers a massive stroke and suddenly the family is forced to confront the reality behind their rhetoric. Karla, the eldest daughter, is an unhappily married union activist, falling for a politically naive shop keeper. The middle daughter Rosa, a disillusioned Marxist, is exploring Orthodox Judaism and the Litvinoff’s adopted son Lenny mocks his family’s altruistic veneer with his lazy, self-centred attitude.

Heller’s blazing satire is reminiscent of Franzen’s The Corrections, but with the volume turned up loud.