Isaac Sullivan has been bitter ever since his alcoholic father’s on-the-job mishap forced Isaac to quit high school and join the family plumbing business. At 36, the overly intelligent, underemployed plumber and aspiring doctor is looking to say goodbye to leaky toilets and his podunk hometown of Paradise, Michigan. While he waits to hear about the status of his application to the University of Michigan’s pre-med program, Sullivan performs rudimentary surgery on local wildlife to improve his operating-room skills, listens to medical podcasts, surfs Internet porn, falls in love with a high-school senior, and provides commentary on the possible medical conditions of his plumbing customers.

He also entertains homicidal yet comic daydreams that may be a sign of mental illness, or may be nothing more than a harmless outlet for the pent-up resentment accrued from a life that has seemingly gone off the rails. In one midday reverie, Isaac fantasizes about breaking into the local nursing home with a shotgun, believing it to be filled with zombies rather than Alzheimer’s sufferers. In another, he imagines using a pencil to perform a tracheotomy on a condescending guidance counsellor who chokes with laughter at Isaac’s request for a college reference letter. He also carries on hilarious conversations with his calm inner voice/conscience.

Exit Papers from Paradise is thin on plot, but more than makes up for this with sardonic humour and Gen-X cultural references (The Matrix, Guns ’n’ Roses, The Addams Family). At times, the book seems less like a novel than a good stand-up comedy act or therapy session observed from behind one-way glass. It’s funny, but the rawness of the material occasionally makes you cringe.