This book wasn’t for me. I decided not to review it on my site or any of the major retailers/Goodreads.

An interesting combo of a memoir combined with excerpts from her advice column. Meredith Goldstein gives us a glimpse of her life and then at the end of each chapter inserts one or more dear abby letters she received and responded to with a few of the online comments. I completely adored this book.

I loved how the reader was given insight to her life and what she was personally dealing with and how that influenced her response to each letter and reader. I have never written a letter into a dear abby, but this book made me want to, just to see what kind of response I would receive both from the author of the column and to the readers of the column.

I also don't read comments on newspaper articles online and I may just have to after this book! How interesting that she thought of her repeat commenters as a community and to invite them to a happy hour was probably the best thing I read! I never thought about this group as being a possible cohesive group, makes me think.

I would love to read another one of these from Meredith Goldstein and from someone else who writes newspaper columns. I enjoyed her personal context made things make so much more sense.

A memoir that could easily be a cute romantic comedy starring Reece WItherspoon or a TV show. I loved it!

This was a charming memoir. I thoroughly enjoyed reading through both Meredith's advice and her own life experiences with carrer, family, romance, and her mother's illness.

I grew up watching my grandmother read Dear Abby and Ann Landers. To my 4 year old eyes the face of wisdom was an older woman with big coiffed hair. Both of these women hailed from another time. A much simpler time where people stayed happily married until death do they part. But this was not my life. The very reason that I was my grandmother's house was that I was visiting my Dad for the weekend. They represented a perfection to which I would not be able to maintain. Of course as I got older I learned about their estranged relationship and then I felt duped. Foolish enough to think that the grass was greener on the other side.

So when I saw Can't Help Myself: Lessons and Confessions from a Modern Advice Columnist on NetGalley it appealed to me. I found that it was an honest and sometimes self-deprecating memoir. Goldstein opened up to her audience revealing her vulnerability in both her romantic and familial relationships. The writing style was easy going and each chapter ended with past segments of her advice column along with reader comments and feedback. Meredith Goldstein's column Love Letters: A Daily Dispatch of Dating and Relationship Advice can be found online here:
https://loveletters.boston.com

I am completely fascinated with advice columns and one of my favorite podcasts is Dear Sugars (Cheryl Strayed's book, Tiny Beautiful Things, is also one of my favorite books ever). This book, which is a combination of that and a quirky memoir, seemed absolutely perfect for me.

I don't read the column so this was my first introduction to Meredith Goldstein and Love Letters. It's unusual in that readers also write in and give advice---even more unusual these days, because the people are generally pretty awesome and sincere. It's like they've found the only troll-free place on the internet! 

This book was incredibly fun and I want to be friends with Meredith. Also, I have years worth of back columns to read. Win-win!

*Can't Help Myself: Lessons & Confessions from a Modern Advice Columnist* by Meredith Goldstein is part memoir and part life lessons learned. I loved this book. It funny, relateable, and insightful. I loved that at the end of each chapter there was a question one of her advice column readers had asked along with her response as well as that of other commentators.

This is Meredith Goldstein's first book and I loved it. I think there will definitely be more books coming from this author.

I would like to thank Netgalley, the author and publisher for providing me with a review copy in exchange for my honest and unbiased opinion of it.

Can’t Help Myself: Lessons and Confessions from a Modern Advice Columnist by Meredith Goldstein is a fun and engaging memoir that began with Ms. Goldstein’s employment as a journalist at the Boston Globe. Friends and family members sought her opinion and advice for years, including her mother, who had difficulty dating in her early forties following her divorce from Goldstein’s father. Assisting her mother writing dating profiles was the easy part, though offering advice as her mother listened closely, was a bit more challenging.

With the economy crashing in 2008, the Globe accepted Goldstein’s offer to write an advice column that would engage readers and encourage readership. Feeling guilty over being so down and out over her recent break-up with co-worker Patrick, that included crying jags at the vending machines next to the freight elevators-- Goldstein wondered if she could actually help others. Lisa, her good friend had shockingly lost her husband from an undectected health condition, explained that her loss of Patrick was like “a death of a relationship.”

Only with a strong interest reading Carolyn Hax of the Washington Post, Dan Savage of the alternative press, Amy Dickenson of “Ask Amy” and Margo Howard the brilliant and witty daughter of Ann Landers and niece of her twin sister “Dear Abby”—Goldstein realized she had no experience. Without a psychology degree or qualifying credentials Goldstein began writing her highly successful column “Love Letters” for the Globe The advice clips were always entertaining and interesting, especially with reader input.

Though Goldstein never wanted to marry or live with Patrick, or have children at all, she was especially distressed to hear he eventually replaced her with another woman. Brette, Goldstein’s brazen and sexually adventurous sister married her much younger lover Ben in a charming outdoor wedding. Goldstein writes well about her ordinary life as this small childless family faced a tragic and sad crisis with their mother’s cancer diagnosis. 3* GOOD. **With thanks and appreciation to Grand Central Publishing via NetGalley for the DDC for the purpose of review.

Link of review to be added below once review is live on the blog.

One of the great things about reading for NetGalley is the opportunity to explore books that I might not have picked up under other circumstances. This book is one of those, and it turned out to be quite a treat. Meredith writes, and orchestrates, a LOVE LETERS column in Boston. In this book, she manages to gracefully weave her own story into those of her readers and advice givers.

Unlike typical advice columns, Meredith asks readers to chime in with their own council and help the writer. These letters and pieces of reader advice are tucked between chapters describing Meredith's own issues, her inability to find a life partner and the harrowing death of her mother.

I loved the honesty of her own accounts and I enjoyed reading about the problems and solutions of her readers.. This is a book that proved to be endlessly fascinating and totally original Her idea for an advice column was brilliant, as is the way she combines both her own and the readers' stories. Such a lovely read!