Imagine a wonderfully rude, children's version of "It's a Wonderful Life." At the beginning of the tale we have a good man, a caring man, heading for his job as a cookie-taster but also heading for a terrible fate (he's about to step in something smelly). Is this an accident? Who's responsible? (The Gigglers, elfen creatures whose pranks punish wayward adults.) What did he do to deserve this? (He yelled at his children unfairly, but actually this was a bit of a misunderstanding.) Can the impending mess be avoided? Working backward, Roddy Doyle spins the hilarious tale of Mr. Mack, his wife Billy Jean, his three children Robbie, Jimmy, and Kayla, their dog Rover and, of course, the irrepressible, sometimes hasty, but well-meaning Gigglers.