Casey is 31, carrying the weight of student loan debt, mourning the death of her mother, living in a former potting shed, waitressing at a relatively upscale restaurant, and filled with words: words from books her mother read to her, the books and writers that have been her constant companions, and the words for a book she knows she has to write.
Six years of straining to put these words on paper.
“I don’t write because I think I have something to say. I write because if I don’t, everything feels even worse.”
Lily King masters the vivid power of metaphor: over and over the reader will want to dwell on lyrical passages that draw you in to Casey’s inner conversations about life, her fears and hopes as she reaches for love and her true creative self. Is it attainable? A memorable ending.

It’s 1997 in Boston in Writers & Lovers, where Casey is broke and waiting tables as she attempts to pay off her massive debt and pursue a writing career. Her apartment is questionable, her job is barely getting her by, and she’s reeling from both the death of her mother and a recent romance — It’s a lot for anyone to deal with, especially someone with a limited support network, though she does turn to her brother and her best friend where she can.

Add in a health scare, an arrogant landlord, and the fear of rejection that all writers undoubtedly experience at some time or another, and Casey is understandably overwhelmed. She also meets two different men: Oscar, a widowed father and successful writer, and Silas, a middle school teacher and fellow aspiring writer. closer to her own age. She’s drawn to both of them for various reasons.

Writers & Lovers is the first Lily King book I’ve read and I enjoyed it. Though I grew up a few year later, I appreciated the 90s references, and feel like a few more wouldn’t have hurt. As an avid reader and someone who has casually dreamed of writing a book — someday — the premise of this story was interesting and I was rooting for Casey.

Slow pacing, kind of boring. Didn’t care for the characters or the way that the story was structured. Just an okay read to pass the time.

‘I have a pact with myself not to think about money in the morning.’

Casey (Camila) Peabody is thirty-one years old. Her mother has died suddenly, she is estranged from her father, she is struggling under a burden of debt. She is living in a shed, her mail consists of wedding invitations and demands from debt collectors. Casey is working as a waitress in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and trying to finish the novel she has been working on for the past six years.

‘I don’t write because I think I have something to say. I write because if I don’t, everything feels even worse.’

Casey’s life becomes more complicated. Two quite different men enter her life: she falls for both. Casey also has health issues to address. Casey is drowning in debt, uncertain about her writing, mourning her mother. She cannot stay where she is, but she is not sure how to take the next step.

This is an introspective story, filled with conflict between despair and possibility, anxiety and hope. Casey is filled with self-doubt, unable to move at times. Is her novel any good? Can she complete it? Which of the two men she’s fallen for would she be happiest with?

‘You don’t realize how much effort you’ve put into covering things up until you try to dig them out.’

The novel finishes, but the story continues in my imagination. Ms King succeeded in breathing life into Casey and making me care about her. I am wondering what the future might hold for Casey.

Note: My thanks to NetGalley and Grove Atlantic for providing me with a free electronic copy of this book for review purposes.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

I'm not a writer, but I have been a reader living in a run-down apartment adjacent to Harvard Square, so I felt a bit like Casey Peabody was a kindred spirit. Casey's got a bad case of writer's block, a love triangle, and is dealing with grief. This is a book for lovers of the written word, and I look forward to reading more from Lily King.

Many thanks to NetGalley, the author, and the publisher for providing me with a copy of this book. All thoughts are my own.

This is the story of Casey Peabody, a 31-year-old woman who has lost her mother and has been through a breakup recently. Casey has been writing a book for six years and has been trying to finish it while she breathlessly works as a waitress.
As the story unfolds, we can see how she has to deal with her lifelong friends that are getting married and start to have the lives they're supposed to have because of their age. King accurately describes that being over 30 doesn't mean your life's solved but actually starting; the character struggles mentally, financially, and romantically.
The first half of the book was really slow-paced for me compared to the second half, which is important somehow since you can feel the anxiety and hopelessness Casey has. Throughout the book, we can see more characters, like Oscar, Silas, Muriel, Harry, Caleb, and Adam but none of them has enough development. I still celebrate Muriel, Harry, and Casey's friendship, though, but I disliked completely one of her romantic relationships completely; I never liked the way he always referred or talked to her at all. Also, I felt as forced as she felt it.
Writers & Lovers isn't for everyone, maybe that's why I felt I wouldn't finish it. What totally makes it up are the parts about writing. King completely nailed it, at least when it comes to amateur writers like me, I don't know about the rest. She talks about the fears and expectations that come with it with the right words, and I know that more than one will feel identified it with those quotes.

Lily King does it again. I inhaled her previous book, Euphoria, in under a day, and this one was a similar experience. A really compelling look at grieving and how we can drift in life, not really knowing which way to push ourselves. We struggle to create, to pursue our goals, and to choose who would make a good partner.

I thought some of the supporting characters were almost indistinguishable from each other but this was a cute, quirky story. I'd love to know what happens to Casey next!

*My ARC was provided by the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

I'm a longtime fan of Lily King's novels, and this one did not disappoint. One of the things that most amazes me about her work is the wide variety. Writers & Lovers is vastly different than Euphoria, which had nothing in common at all with Father of Rain...except for King's powerful, lovely writing style that draws me in no matter the subject.

Writers & Lovers is about a young woman who is blocked in her writing and making a living as a waitress. Set in the 1990s, it captures that quality of being freshly on your own and how you can look like you're fine on the outside but have a whole host of fear, hope, longing, loss and frustration roiling inside.

Quiet and deep, this is a book that will draw you into a place of nostalgia and having you thinking about how you've navigated similar seasons of life.

Thanks to NetGalley for providing a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

3.8, rounded up

I want euphoria!!

And I don’t have it. King’s earlier book, Euphoria, made me haul out my pogo stick, but this one is pedestrian and had me walking briskly instead. Wait, I don’t mean it’s mediocre—it’s definitely a notch above that because King’s writing is so good. It’s a matter of plot. Euphoria was special because it was set in the jungle, with lots of adventure thrown in among the good sentences.

Writers and Lovers has no exotic setting or plot. It’s about a woman in her early thirties who isn’t a happy camper. Her mother has just died, her boyfriend has just dumped her, she’s in debt up to her eyeballs. She wants to get published but meanwhile she’s stuck waitressing. She has two guys she’s interested in, yada yada. We follow her as she navigates life. A far cry from the fascinating, far-away jungle. Expectations are a bitch.

Nevertheless, this is well-written and thoughtful, and I enjoyed it. I cared about the main character, Casey, and related to her in some ways, even though she’s so young. One of the highlights of the book is King’s description of waitressing. I spent a lot of my young years as a waitress, and King has the scene down pat.

The story about being a fledgling writer also was well done. There are some excellent thoughts about reading and writing:

“Then I understood how hard it is to re-create in words what you see and feel in your head.”

“…while you’re reading it rubs off on you and your mind stats working like that for a while. I love that. That reverberation for me is what is most important about literature. Not themes or symbols or the rest of that crap they teach in high school.”

Complaint Board (minor whines)

-Writing kids wrong is a pet peeve. There were two boys, ages 5 and 7, and they sometimes sounded older than they were. I found myself clucking, “Kids just don’t talk that way!” King even has them playing ping pong! Hello, they aren’t tall enough to pull that off! Conversations with the boys just never rang true. (I read an earlier book by King, Father of the Rain, which I didn’t much like, and one of my complaints there, too, was that she didn’t have the kids right.) I’m guessing that King doesn’t have kids, but who knows.

-The story is set in the 1990s, but the only references to the era are pantyhose and electric typewriters. First of all, I don’t think electric typewriters were still being used in the 1990s. Second, why throw in just a couple of references? As it was, I was jolted when I ran into those references; the story wasn’t steeped in the era enough for me to feel all cozy there. I’m thinking that King wrote this story in the 1990s and maybe saw no reason to update it. I guess I wanted an updated version. And for some reason I don’t want to think that she grabbed it off an old shelf and dusted it off and called it new. Though I realize that’s weird on my part—why should I care? Why do I want brand new, lol?

-There were some mean conversations; I don’t think people talk like that. They may think mean things but seldom do they voice them—they’re either too nice, too repressed, or too chicken to blurt out poisonous sentences. The book starts with a landlord making a terrible comment to Casey. Didn’t believe it. Then there were a couple of brutal yelling matches in the restaurant where Casey worked. Didn’t believe those either.

Despite my whines, it’s a good read and I liked it quite a bit. King has a smart style and avoids being sentimental—no small feat when there is millennial romance and little kids around. Still, I wanted some euphoria, like King so kindly provided earlier.

Thanks to NetGalley for the advance copy.

Unfortunately, this one just didn't work out for me. I found the characters boring and pretentious while the story moved too slowly. The book follows Casey and her job as a waitress for over half of the book while the other half talked about her lovers and how much she wanted to write but couldn't. I found myself extremely uninterested. Regardless, thank you netgalley and to the publisher for allowing me a copy!

A beautiful novel about grief, love, creativity, and work. is a struggling writer in her early thirties, mourning the recent death of her mother, suffering heartache over a breakup, toiling as a waitress while working on a novel she doesn't believe she will ever finish. She lives in a garden shed, buried under enormous student debt. In short, her live is a mess. She sees her peers settling into responsible jobs and relationships, many giving up the dream of supporting themselves as writers. Along come two men, one a seemingly mature choice with two adorable kids, the other possibly just another repeat of the irresponsible men she has been drawn to in the past.
There are many times in this novel that you want to shake Casey, as she wallows in her grief and anxiety and continues to make bad choices. But she feels like such a real person! And thanks to Lily King for allowing this book to still be infused with hope and possibility for Casey's future.
The one part that didn't necessarily gel for me was her backstory as a child golf prodigy, and her relationship with her father. But that is a small complaint for a novel that I was truly moved by.

Typically I would not say that I enjoy books about writers, but this is the exception. Casey is a writer that has been working on her novel for the last six years. She uses the daytime to write and satisfy her creative needs and she waitresses at night to pay the bills. We also get a glimpse of her inner anxieties as she struggles to deal with her grief over her mother's death, the burden of heavy student loan debt, unsettling past circumstances, health issues, and on top of all this she lives in a tiny shed. She is fresh out of a breakup and wrestles with who of the two new men that come into her life she should be with. I could understand how she felt about both of the men and why she made the decisions she did. This is an introspective look into the life of a young women who is anxious and does not have it all together, but that is trying to work it out the best that she can with what she has. I found this very likable and relatable. Casey throughout the novel was true to herself and it was so easy to root for her. I thoroughly enjoyed this book, and was very happy with the ending.

A character driven novel that delves deep into what it means to be an author. The novel centres on Casey, a 30-something woman who has been working on a novel for the past 6 years and is trying to figure out her next step in life after the death of her mother. This novel felt real and relatable. Life is difficult. There is often more than one right choice that can be made in a situation. And because of that I could understand Casey's choices even if I don't agree with them. It took me a bit to get a hold of the writing style, but the last quarter of the book really sold me on it. I really liked how all of it came together in the end.

I loved Casey. She felt so real and relatable to me and I have never read about a protagonist like her before. I’m so grateful I got to read this book.

Another winner from Lily King. Such a lovely, gifted writer....her words sing to me and pull me deep inside her characters. And a happy ending! We could all use a happy ending these days.

Highly recommend.

Thanks to NetGalley and Grove Press for an ARC of this wonderful book. My review, however, is based on the hardcover version.

5 stars.*

Wow. I wasn't sure what to expect when I began reading this book but I loved Euphoria so much that I decided it didn't matter.

Writers & Lovers is the story of Camila (Casey) Peabody who moves to Boston after the death of her mother in 1997 with her sights set on finishing her novel and just living. What transpires is a beautiful tale of friendship, creation, love affairs and family.

I love Lily King and her writing style and I will read anything that she writes. Highly recommended for fans of all types of modern fiction and those that came of age in the late 90s.

*with thanks to Netgalley for the digital ARC in exchange for this honest review.

Thanks to Grove Atlantic and NetGalley for granting me an ARC (although received well after the book had been published!) for Writers & Lovers.
Having lived in the Boston/Cambridge year for the last decade, I loved Writers & Lovers in part because the setting was described so accurately that I could see myself everywhere! The detailed descriptions extended to the characters - each is still clearly defined in my mind. The scene where her father and stepmother come into her restaurant was painful and awkward and yet I reread it several times, impressed by how the author caused my visceral reactions.
I related the the main character and appreciated her commitment to making room in her life for her writing. While I enjoyed the frenetic pace as the. Book comes to a climax, the end was a little too perfectly wrapped up for me to feel it was believable.

new 5 star read 😍 ~ when @michellereadsbooks and @whatsofieread gushed about WRITERS & LOVERS by Lily King, I *knew* it was one for me. verdict: ADORED IT. ⠀
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I loved the writing, I loved Casey's story and the seamless way a book about living everyday life became so much more and impossible to put down. It's so different from Euphoria but amazing in its own right. this is one that will stay with me!⠀
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I tried to attempt to read this and found it really hard to get into. So I purchased the audiobook to try and help. I felt I was confused the first half and not sure exactly what was going on. I wasn't interested in the characters and found parts to be a little disgusting.