JMSwan

Spectacular. Absolutely crushed me.

Grateful that I finished it, even if the circumstances surrounding doing so were enormously difficult.

This story, its characters, its heart, its kindness, is a generous gift. I would recommend this to anyone and everyone.

This book rocks. I really wish this podcast was real. Joy and Benny are so great.

So lovely and refreshing. Big fan of Ms. Vera Wong. 💜

Simply brilliant writing. Thoroughly enjoyed.

The first 2/3rds of this book absolutely rocked and the ending left me with a bad taste in my mouth. Absolutely adore Stephen Fishbach and would read whatever else he ends up writing, but I wasn’t as big a fan of this as I really wanted to be.

I think subconsciously the first time that I read this, I viewed Celia St. James as this relatively perfect partner - or at least subsequently I remembered her that way in the 3 years since I read it the first time, but this reread made her more human for me in a way I wasn’t expecting, but definitely appreciated.

Love Taylor Jenkins Reid 💜

Just being real, Wyn sucks. Harriet deserved better. The defenders will say that they were both bad at communicating, but Wyn was responsible and man did he suck at communicating.

I think I knew pretty immediately that I loved this book too much to finish it quickly, which weirdly enough was a concept I playfully argued with a friend about a few weeks ago. I thought that leaving a small portion of the book (or show or movie) left unconsumed was silly, but in reading this book, no part of me wanted to be done with it. It was just so much of what I wanted or needed to read. I really really loved it and I’m very glad to have read it. I’ll come back to it again in the future, of that I’m certain.

This was a fine enough read, until the end, which came out of nowhere and really thrilled and excited me. I think it made the read worth it.

I really enjoyed this! It gets right to the point in a way that was satisfying as a reader, no fluff. I’m glad I read it and I’ll be thinking about it for a while I think.

A great and beautiful book. Made me weep!

So gripping! Just took me by storm. Such a blast to read. Could not put it down!

I think this book is really interesting, but it’s far too slow for my tastes and the stakes felt too low for me, if I’m honest. I enjoyed it, don’t get me wrong, but maybe just not as much as everyone else did.

I cried like a dozen times… 5 stars

I really enjoyed this! I was gripped the whole way through and the author continually made compelling choices that had me thinking. Tons of moments where I thought "I should write that down, that's a great line!". I would recommend this one to friends :)

I'm rounding up from 2.5 stars to be generous. I think this had so much potential, but it really didn't feel like a complete thought or a finished story. Love Jason Pargin's TikToks and his writing style was enough to keep me engaged the entire read, but by the end I just wanted some actual change within the main character. He kinda sucked a lot and didn't really seem to evolve in that. It just sort of felt like I read an early draft of a novel that could have been great, but didn't quite get the editing and plot adjustments needed to get there.

All that being said, the writing style for the book was genuinely very fun and I unironically loved that Pargin used character monologues to discuss fun facts he was excited to share, and that some of them came back to be important plot devices. I also think the book had a lot of valuable things to say about society and specifically internet culture, but again not enough of that value.

Despite the less than stellar review, I remain excited to read his other work.

This was a reread but I found it as gripping and interesting and fun and endearing as the first time. This book is glorious. Amaze.

T.J. Newman always strikes a remarkably profound chord with me. She really captures the feeling of everyone coming together to solve a problem that's make or break, life or death. I cried really hard throughout all of this one. I've read all of her books, but this one was easily the heaviest and hardest.

I was a little worried early on that she might have chosen too many stories to tell in this one, but as usual she nailed it.

I don't think I'll tire of reading her extremely intense thrillers any time soon.

Absolutely couldn't put it down! So so so good. I'll be thinking about this one for a long time.

I very confidently thought to myself “Wow I guess this book isn't gonna make me cry” about 15 minutes before I started sobbing uncontrollably in my car because of this book, so another point for Fredrik Backman, I suppose.

This gave me such a beautiful insight into the worlds my parents and grandparents grew up in. For so much of this book, it felt like I was reading about my mom's life. Loved this.

I think this was more enjoyable than Addie LaRue and stuck the landing better than Addie LaRue, but not as much as I'd hoped it would. Still enormously charming and very easy to get sucked into.

This book made me cry in the middle of a food court. 5 stars.

Oh my god

I'll be honest here. I found this book utterly mind numbing and after starting it, I literally had to force myself to pick it back up. I never once felt any sort of desire to continue, whatsoever. It was just a deep dive into mundanity and being well-written is not an excuse for me to finish a book that I find painful and horribly boring to read. Nothing about this interested me and I'm sure I just didn't “get it”, but if I'm being perfectly honest, I'm not sure I want to “get it”. Frustrating book. I genuinely would rather watch paint dry than read another page of this book. At least with the paint, I have something to root for.