Let's All Be Happy Today

by Joel Allegretti

210 pages, Paperback

Published October 21, 2025

About the author

Joel Allegretti is the author of two full-length collections from The Poet's Press: The Plague Psalms, which appeared in 2000 and is now in its third edition, and Father Silicon, selected by The Kansas City Star as one of 100 Noteworthy Books of 2006, a list that included novels by Thomas Pynchon and Cormac McCarthy. In March 2010 Poets Wear Prada published his third collection, Thrum, a chapbook of poems, prose poems and brief poetic essays about musical instruments. Raymond Hammond, editor of The New York Quarterly, calls Thrum "an intriguing and must read for anyone who has a sense of all that culminates in the commingling of the arts."

Allegretti's work has appeared in Art/Life Limited Editions, Rattapallax, The New York Quarterly, Descant, The Laurel Review, Margie, and Confrontation among many other journals, as well as in the anthology Chance of a Ghost (Helicon Nine Editions, 2005) which included work by Billy Collins, Rita Dove and James Tate. His poem in that collection received an Honorable Mention in the 2006 edition of The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror from St. Martin's Press.
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Reviews

[Swapna Peri ( Book Reviews Cafe ) · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Let’s All Be Happy Today" is a striking, unflinching collection that pulls readers straight into the raw edges of everyday life, refusing to soften the truths it explores. From the very first story, Allegretti sets the tone with sharp, unsentimental observations about human vulnerability, highlighting how ordinary moments can tilt into the unsettling without warning. His writing balances clarity with emotional depth, delivering vignettes that linger long after the page is turned.

Across the book, Allegretti introduces a cast of characters navigating grief, fractured relationships, and the weight of memory. Whether it’s a mother stunned by the loss of her son, children carrying the trauma of multiple tragedies, or families quietly unraveling behind closed doors, each narrative underscores how life’s hardships shape us in ways both visible and hidden. Scenes like Morgan witnessing her father’s fall, or Carol and Brian wrestling with fears about adopting trauma-scarred children, reveal Allegretti’s gift for depicting emotional truth with precision and empathy.

One of the book’s strengths is its ability to shift between voices and settings while maintaining a consistent emotional undercurrent. Allegretti moves fluidly from domestic tension to psychological unraveling, from suburban kitchens to seaside tragedies, always grounding each moment in recognizable human feeling. Even in the darkest scenes—such as the quiet dread that builds through Evan’s unraveling personal life or the haunting discoveries along a desolate shore—the storytelling never feels gratuitous. Instead, it invites readers to witness pain honestly, without easy resolutions.

Ultimately, "Let’s All Be Happy Today" is a collection that embraces the complexity of being human. Allegretti doesn’t promise comfort, yet his stories resonate because they hold a mirror to the fears, disappointments, and fragile hopes we all navigate. The result is a bold, beautifully crafted work that challenges readers to face the truths we often avoid, reminding us that confronting life head-on can be its own kind of courage—and, in its way, a path toward clarity.