Husbad Material caught me completely by surprise! The cover and title lead me to believe this was going to be an enjoyable but shallow rom-com abut a woman dating to find that "husband material" kind of guy. But what I got, was a sweet and heartfelt story about a young woman mourning the loss of her husband. When the ashes of her dead husband show up on her doorstep 5 years after his death, Charlotte Rosen is faced with a new "unearthing" of past feelings, where she thought she'd be 5 years later, missing her husband, and how to move on in the dating world.

I really enjoyed the raw nature Belden wrote about Charlotte grieving for her husband and the support group she attended for mourning widows. There were lots of sweet moments in this book and side stories that I thought really helped support the main story.

The title and cover is very misleading for this book because it carried way more weight and depth than the typical rom-com type of books.

I would definitely suggest this book to my friends!
Thank you Netgalley and Harlequin Books for this free copy.

Overall, this one was a little lukewarm. Not quite a romance, not quite drama. It was...middle of the road.

The end was sort of weird with the tone of the narrator. I am, however, glad that Charlotte realized she was being a complete poop and the worst friend ever.

This sort of reminded me of another book I read, The Right Swipe mixed with How to Hack a Heartbreak except Swipe was better and Heartbreak was worse.
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Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for this free ebook in exchange for an honest review!

My first comment to readers out there... this is NOT a romance novel despite being classified as one on Netgalley, where I received a complimentary copy. Husband Material is definitely chick lit/women's fic.

I'm honestly not quite sure what the author was trying to accomplish with this book. Charlotte, our heroine, is very difficult to follow. She's neurotic, flighty and although I sympathized with the loss of her husband (I did cry a few times), I never really liked her or connected with her. I also didn't care for the vapid, silly LA setting for a lot of the story. All of the social media references became extremely boring and I skimmed a lot of the book.

Our hero, Brian, is probably the best thing about the book. When he and Charlotte are together, it's at least intriguing and they have some good chemistry. Unfortunately, after the big secret about Charlotte's husband comes out, Brian isn't quite as likable.

I am very disappointed as the synopsis of this book intrigued me and I was hoping for a little emotion and a few laughs along with a sweet romance. What I got was a fairly annoying heroine, waaay too much social media referencing (due to Charlotte's job) and a fairly lackluster secret and romance. I'm not familiar with this author's other books but I probably won't be reading them anytime soon.

This was different, and not entirely what I expected. The publicity makes it look like a light, breezy rom-com, but it is definitely more serious and even a little depressing -- although very well written and a good story. The premise is great, but the execution is a little shaky in places, because the protagonist's decisions and explanations for those decisions seem like a stretch. I was shaking my head in places, and did want to actually reach into the book and shake her.

This is the 1st book I've read by Emily Belden and I'm not quite sure how I feel about it all. The story jist left an impact fraught with emotion that is touching. Excellent subject matter.
The presentation was disjointed for me, and I'm not sure if it was intended that way.
Charlotte was an emotional, self centered mess. Her life was numbers, obsessive about it really, she could control everything through using them.
When the urn shows up, her life, drastically for her anyway, changes with revelations. She is forced to deal with a reality that occurred 5 years ago.
I would have liked a hero here. While Brian was there for her and helped her, he played a big part in the whole keeping secrets from her.
Char goes to a grief counseling group. So this one time makes things fall into place in her mind? That's remarkable!
She also did a lot of mind talking I felt was unnecessary, and didn't add a thing to the story, except words.
This seemed quite realistic, as if it truly was someone's story, ramblings and all.
I think there's a happy ending, it seems there is.
If you think my review is kind of scattered, it is!
I received an advance reader's copy thru Netgalley and am giving my honest thoughts and opinions voluntarily

Husband Material had a very interesting premise. When I finally got around to reading it, I had forgotten the summary. It was interesting getting to know Charlotte and the way her brain worked after her trauma. The love story felt real and was well constructed. I wasn't a fan of the whole algorithm aspect of the story, but I liked how things played out in the end. It was a great little book.

The premise of this book sounded incredibly promising, however the execution fell short for me. Charlotte is clearly still dealing with her status as a widow by actively NOT dealing with it, but some of the twists and character development didn't feel terribly grounded or realistic. The mother in law in particular comes to mind, along with the multiple times Charlotte "confessed" her marital status, each time making me roll my eyes even more than the last. I wanted to like it, but there were just too many holes in the story.

29-year old Charlotte thinks she has her life all figured out. That is, until her husband, Decker’s ashes show up on her doorstep unexpectedly. Charlotte’s spent nearly the last 5-years hiding that she’s a widow and now that her past is right before her eyes, she doesn’t know how to handle it.

Charlotte wasn’t prepared to battle with Decker’s mom over who gets to keep his ashes. And she didn’t know that Decker’s best friend, Brian, would be apart of her life again.

Although it’s been 5-years, Charlotte hasn’t truly tackled her grief from becoming a widow at such a young age. Even though at first Decker’s ashes reappearing in her life seemed like a sad reminder of his death, it turns out it helped Charlotte finally move on. And Brian helps Charlotte see that maybe love is still out there for her after all.

Husband Material is Emily Belden’s latest contemporary standalone novel. This story started off of a terrific note—Charlotte has a terrible blind date and her best friend’s wedding. Such a relatable and humorous situation. But after that, the story strayed from the humor and turned out to be more serious. Except the issue was I never felt emotional connected to Charlotte and I didn’t like our hero, Brian. I’m sad to say this story was a hot mess. 2/5 stars.

Thank you NetGalley, Graydon House and Emily Belden for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

The first couple sentences of Husband Material will get you. It has that immediate shock value and you're left thinking "excuse me?!".

Charlotte Rosen is a coder with a hot social media analytics company. She works hard and it shows an idea of what it might be like to be in a field that has a predominantly different gender. She has a roommate that has really no idea of her past. Within the first few sentences, you find out a lot about Charlotte and the biggest thing is that she was married, and that her husband had passed away. When her late husband's ashes show up at her front door five years after his passing, Charlotte's entire life gets uprooted, so you think. When a major secret comes out to Charlotte about her late husband, things really get crazy for her. While dealing with all of these things, will she find love along the way?

This book had a lot of promising qualities. The interest of what was going to happen was definitely there for me. I think that the premise was something that I had never read before and that had me interested. The synopsis was why I requested it in the first place. There were a lot of good things that had me excited for this publication, but as I read on, there were a lot of things that I couldn't really grasp either.

I think one problem that I had was that this novel was classified as a contemporary romance. I live for contemporary romances, so I was excited to see where the romance was going to be from this synopsis. In my opinion, the romance fell a little flat for me. I think there were sweet moments with angst mixed in which is one of my favorites. However, my heart felt as though things were a little rushed and crunched in towards the end. I am someone all for a slow burn, but this was extremely slow. I would've liked it more if things happened a little sooner. Also, I feel as though the romance was a little off. It felt a little stilted and made me question what was going on. There was zero steam, which I usually don't mind, but with the romance-o-meter off, it didn't make me feel my best about this novel.

I also had a problem connecting with Charlotte. I understand that I have never been through such a situation, but I feel like I had a hard time understanding her actions. There were some things that Charlotte did that frustrates me, and in some circumstances this might be good, but I didn't find it giving me any positive, stimulating feelings. She was pretty unreliable with her actions. You definitely want to go through the pages and grab her by the shoulders to shake her.

Lastly, I will say that I found the author to be hilarious. There were some parts of this book that had me laughing out loud. It's rare that a romance novel would be so funny, but I'd definitely consider this as a romantic comedy with some drama!

If you are a clean comedy, chick-lit lover, I'd recommend this book to you! I'm definitely interested in more Emily Belden novels just from the laughs!

Throughout this narrative, Emily Belden offers a case study in how compartmentalization is impossible. Loss and grief cannot be tucked away, controlled. When a young woman's memories resurface on her doorstep after 5 years in the dark, secrets, and a new love, come to light.

I liked the overall premise of this story, as a young widow is reunited with the ashes of her dead husband.  Caught up in old memories and struggling to move forward with her life, she is forced to take personal time off from work to deal with the aftermath.

I liked the two main characters, on and off.  Charlotte Rosen is an incredibly intelligent woman, who is also a scatterbrain (these people exist).  Faced with the memories of her husband don't seem to help her focus.  As for Brian Jackson, for the most part, he seems like a saint, going above and beyond to help out Charlotte.  But he also has told some lies which test the blooming relationship these two could have.  
Note: there really isn't any romance in this book, so don't expect that.

While there is huge potential in the story, I couldn't get past the editing.  The scenes don't flow well, and part of that could be due to this being an ARC, where it wasn't always clear where a scene ended.  The transitions between scenes were too abrupt for me.  With a heavy hand in editing, this story has potential though.

After the death of her husband less than a year into their marriage, Charlotte has never really recovered. We pick up with her 5 years later, and she is honestly still not well. She's buried in work, and this algorithm that she thinks will find her the next "perfect husband." She never grieved her husband, still has a poor relationship with his family, and none of her current friends or coworkers even knew she was once married. One inciting incident, followed by all its inevitable consequences, upends these careful walls that Charlotte has built around her grief and she finally is forced to deal with things, including some new devastating information about her husband that comes to life.

As a story about grief and starting over, I thought it was pretty good. I thought as a contemporary romance, it wasn't as strong. While I liked the brief moments we got to see of Brian & Charlotte's relationship, it was not the central storyline. This is really Charlotte's story.

Not your average rom-com but enjoyable nonetheless. I really liked the title too. Took someone else pointing it out for me to see it.

i admit, based on the cover and blurb, i was expecting a kind of romantic comedy and that is not what i got. which is fine, but not what i expected. not a *huge* fan of all the current references to things like apple watches or alexa devices, i just feel like that dates books and not in a good way, but that could just be me. not a huge fan of the main character, but that could be me personally. perhaps just right book, wrong time, who knows.

Fun read! Charlotte, having hidden her past as a young widow to friends and coworkers, is thrown for a loop when the ashes of her husband appear at her door. As a coder for social media influencers, she has developed a new program to help you find a mate but she uses it to keep potential dates away. Now her husbands best friend, her mother in law and her room mate are all involved as she tries to keep her life together. And then a secret from her husbands past threatens to destroy the tenuous ties of friendship and potential love that she has found.

I was given a free copy of this book by the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Honestly, I almost quit this book several times, especially in the beginning. The starting exposition was too flat. There were a lot of attempts to name-drop brands and sound "edgy" or "hip" that didn't work. I mostly didn't connect with or sometimes even like Charlotte, and I never felt any of the secondary characters were fleshed out enough. Even the romance was mostly "meh" and quickly tied up in a little bow during the epilogue.
When I finished the book I realized that my expectations were for one novel and I got another. The cover and even the blurb make it sound more like a romantic comedy/drama, but the overall book was more about a widow who's never properly dealt with her grief. I feel that with some editing and a change in marketing tactics this book might show some promise as a contemporary fiction book, but I just didn't feel it worked as what it's being presented as.

This was ok. I came away feeling a bit indifferent, I guess. I just don't know. It was well written, just didn't really consume me the way I'd hoped.

This was a good, quick read. It dealt with a heavier subject, which shouldn't have surprised me when things got a little heavy, but it did. The first half of the book is your typical chick lit/romance fare. The last half to third of the book became a little darker with a tinge of mystery. I was unprepared for this type of turn in the story. This isn't necessarily bad, but it wasn't what I thought it was going in. The writing is very good and the characters are likable enough.

I read Hot Mess by Belden when it came out and really enjoyed the way she told a story.  This is less a romance and more a contemporary fiction, much like Hot Mess (even though I've seen Hot Mess on several romance shelves). The point isn't the happily ever after, it's about a woman coming to terms with who she is and who her deceased husband was as people. I found it to be an enjoyable read and recommend it. Pub date: December 30, 2019

This review will take a look at the book Husband Material by Emily Belden. I received an eARC of this romance through NetGalley. It's release date is December 30, 2019, and I encourage romance fans to pick it up once it is released since I thoroughly enjoyed reading it.

Belden's charming story <em>Husband Material </em>centers on Charlotte Rosen, a 29-year-old with a secret she has worked hard to keep from literally everyone in her life. She works in data and risk analysis, and surrounded herself with learning to avoid her past. Other than her cute dog, and weekly phone calls with her mom, Charlotte has also effectively removed all contact with people in her past life from her life.

But life has a way of giving you lemons when you least want to deal with them. An unexpected package brings Charlotte crashing into her past and reeling about how to deal with its contents five years after tragedy struck. This brings her back in touch with friends and family she hasn't seen or spoken to in years, and stirs to life past emotions that Charlotte needs to handle.

Can Charlotte learn to forgive those from her past, and move forward in life? I found this romance had so many layers to it than just your typical romance normally has. Charlotte must deal with grief, loss, love, and forgiveness, while chasing a future of happiness. It was a touching read, so I hope you'll grab a box of tissues and read a copy of Husband Material by Emily Belden.