Good Material by Dolly Alderton (★★★☆☆)
Audiobook • Spotify • Contemporary Fiction • 2024
Short synopsis: After Andy’s long-term girlfriend Jen breaks up with him, he is heartbroken and adrift. As he pieces together their past, he may finally learn that love stories have more than one ending.
I would give the first 90% of this book 1.5 stars and the final 10% of the book 5 stars. This book is mainly about Andy pining after his ex-girlfriend and doing increasingly weird things to try to figure out where their relationship went wrong (very weird: meeting with a therapist to pretend to be Jen to see what kind of advice the therapist would give him). The last chapters of the book switch to Jen’s perspective and oh, that’s when things got so interesting! I loved being in Jen’s head and learning more about what she was thinking in the days and weeks leading up to the breakup and her reasons for the breakup. I could wholly relate to Jen and I wanted more from her. I don’t know why the author decided to spend 300+ pages in the head of a sad white male comedian who was just so bland. At the very least, she could have made him slightly funny but we didn’t even get any good jokes out of him! Ugh. I don’t know if this was a gender-switching sort of thing (instead of the man being the one to break up with the woman and the woman being heartbroken, we get the male perspective), but it just didn’t work for me. (2.5 stars, rounded up to 3.)
The Pairing by Casey McQuiston (★★★☆☆)
E-Book • Library • Contemporary Romance • 2023
Short synopsis: Two estranged exes, Theo and Kit, accidentally book the same European food and wine tour and challenge each other to a hookup competition to prove they’re over each other—except their old feelings refuse to stay in the past.
This is a steamy, steamy book, my friends. Please steer clear if you don’t love open-door romances because this book had a little bit of everything: straight sex, gay sex, sex toys, threesomes… whew. This is a book about finding yourself after a lifetime of feeling less than perfect. It’s also a book of second-chance love and taking the brave act of putting your heart back into the hands of someone who hurt you deeply. The book is split into two sections: the first half of the European tour, which we get from Theo’s perspective, and the second half from Kit’s perspective. I enjoyed being in Kit’s head much more than Theo’s, and perhaps that’s because they finally admitted their feelings for one another. Before they did that, this book was a straight-up orgy of them hooking up with random people every night and trying to one-up the other. It was fairly exhausting! But once they came together as a couple, swoon. I just loved everything about it! I also could have done without all of the long descriptions of food and wine and the places they were visiting, but I imagine that is a huge highlight for other people. I just find all of that pretty boring so I skimmed a lot of it. All in all, not my favorite romance but a solid one.
Clap When You Land by Elizabeth Acevedo (★★★★★)
Print • Owned • YA • 2020
Short synopsis: After their father dies in a plane crash, Camino in the Dominican Republic and Yahaira in New York discover they are sisters, forcing them to navigate grief, family secrets, and their newfound connection.
This was a novel-in-verse, which is what Elizabeth Acevedo is known for. I’ve read another book by her (The Poet X – also 5 stars) and I am just consistently impressed with the way she’s able to create a complex, compelling narrative through poetry. There was so much happening in this book – grief and poverty and lies and trauma and queerness and culture and love – and somehow this author weaves all of it together in such a beautiful way. These two young girls are navigating the hardest loss of their lives (their father) without knowing that they are sisters, and when they do learn about each other and begin the tentative work of exploring a new relationship together, it’s magical. I just loved this book from beginning to end.
What are you reading?
Oh I liked Bad Material! It was a different POV than I usually enjoy but I liked it!
Right now I’m rereading The Husband’s Secret. I think it was the first Moriarty book I ever read and I see why I immediately read all her books after I read this one!
Oh, I just loved The Husband’s Secret. That was my first Moriarty book, too!
A little off topic, but looking at Nicole’s comment above- The Husband’s Secret was also the first Moriarty book I read, and it’s still one of my favorites.
Anyway- I’m shying away from reading a novel in verse. Is that stupid? You obviously really liked it. Maybe I’ll just look at it at the library or bookstore and see if I would enjoy it.
If it helps, novels in verse go SUPER QUICK. Ha! This one was 400+ pages and it only took me a couple of hours to read overall. Lots of white space!
I just read Ghosts by Dolly Alderton and really liked it! I gave it five stars. I was expecting something much more light and fluffy, but there was a lot of depth to the book and it resonated with me since I dated during my 20s and early 30s. Now I’m reading Pageboy which is a memoir by the star of the film Juno, who transitioned from female to male. My friend Courtney, who is a child psychologist and works in a gender clinic, had recommended it to me and then Maya listed it as one of her best books of 2024, so I bumped it up my list! This year I’m working on always having a diverse book as one of my three books that I have checked out from Libby. My percentage of diverse books declined a bit in 2024, so I want to nip that trend in the bud and move it in the right direction.
One of my friends also recommended Ghosts by Dolly Alderton! I think I am just someone who doesn’t care to read RELATABLE dating stories, HA. Just give me unrealistic romances, please and thank you. I get enough reality in my dating life; I want my reading life to be sunshine and butterflies. 😉
I’ve heard great things about Pageboy!
Oh, Clap When you Land sounds really interesting! I’m going to check that one out. The first book made me think of that song from Gotye that was everywhere in 2011, Somebody That I Used to Know. He’s all hurt that she left, then you hear her side and you’re glad she sent her friends to pick up her records and then changed her number.
I just finished Same as it Ever Was by Claire Lombardo. I liked it a lot. I started out thinking it was one kind of story, and it was, but it was also a lot more. Really good.
I hope you enjoy Clap When You Land! It’s a quick read, too, since there’s so much white space on the pages.
Yes, that Gotye song is a PERFECT companion to this book. Once we heard her side of things, I became even more annoyed by the male character!