Summary of The Illicit Happiness of Other People is a haunting yet darkly humorous exploration of grief, philosophy, and the search for truth, told through the lens of a dysfunctional family in 1980s Madras. The story revolves around Ousep Chacko, a once-promising journalist turned alcoholic, whose life collapses after the sudden death of his teenage son, Unni, an exceptionally gifted cartoonist. Unni falls from the balcony of their home in what appears to be a suicide, but the reasons behind his death remain elusive. Ousep becomes consumed by a relentless obsession to piece together Unni’s final days, poring over his drawings, manuscripts, and cryptic conversations, while probing friends and acquaintances to uncover the meaning hidden in his son’s inner world. Through this investigation, the novel paints a vivid portrait of the Chacko family: Ousep, bitter and self-destructive; his wife, Mariamma, battling her own fragile sanity; and their younger son, Thoma, who quietly absorbs the chaos around him. As Ousep digs deeper, the narrative expands into meditations on the nature of truth, sanity, and happiness, presenting Unni as both a tragic enigma and a philosopher wrestling with life’s absurdities. Manu Joseph deftly mixes satire and sorrow, blending biting social commentary on Indian middle-class respectability with reflections on the limits of human understanding. The novel ultimately becomes less about solving the mystery of Unni’s death and more about exposing the fragility of human happiness and the illusions people cling to in order to survive.