After a Dance: Selected Stories by Bridget O’Connor review – hilariously inappropriate slices of life and death

The Bafta-winning author’s posthumous collection finds laughter in appalling subjects and buzzes with hectic energy

There’s far more pleasure than there should be in these stories, given their frequently appalling subject matter. It’s a selection of the work of Bridget O’Connor, who published two collections of short fiction in the 1990s and won a posthumous Bafta for her adaptation of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy shortly after her death in 2010 at the age of 49.

O’Connor is exceptionally good at making us laugh at things we shouldn’t be laughing at. In Remission, “twig in a wig” Lucy develops “a career in cancer” after finding her diagnosis gives her a new sense of purpose. In Love Jobs, a scene where a pet dog is accidentally killed during a mugging is – I’m sorry – howlingly funny. O’Connor’s mother didn’t like her stories – “there’s enough swearing on buses and television” – but that shouldn’t stop the rest of us.