This is a difficult book to review. Parts of it I loved - the nostalgia of Nina’s childhood, her relationship with her Dad, the way she talked about her ex boyfriend, but there were parts of it that just didn’t ring true to me -<spoiler>having sex with Angelo, Lola being ghosted, Katherine’s weird drunken night at Nina’s.</spoiler> As usual, Dolly Alderton’s writing is easy to follow, easy to consume, and easy to get lost in, I just wish this book hadn’t ended in such a twee way. I wanted to know more about Nina’s family, her Mum’s thought process and perception of ageing, deeper conversations about time and fertility. 3.5 stars, it was fine, I’m sure some will love it, it just didn’t hit the mark for me.

I really enjoyed this book. As with everything Dolly writes it is perceptive, funny and honest. I found the plot with the neighbour a little frustrating and unrealistic, but overall I really enjoyed and sped through it.

Apologies for delay in reviewing. Well written and enjoyable read. Look forward to reading more in the future

Really enjoyed this book. A really good read from start to finish! Thoroughly enjoyable. Thank you net galley for the opportunity to read this title in exchange for a review.

What a joy to read! Full of sweetly sad moments that make you look at things a little bit different. Dementia is an illness close to my heart so it was nice to see it dealt with properly in a tender manner. There was some fun in the story too. A wonderful debut from Dolly.

I love Dollys non fiction pieces and saw this hyped all over social media so was very excited to start it.
Unfortunately the excitement stopped there.
I couldn't finish it, I found the main character flat and annoying

I thought this was a lovely, enjoyable book. A fun journey from the perils of dating to the perils of "interesting' neighbours and, of course, the messy business of growing up (and old). Many thanks to #Netgalley for the read!

Dolly Alderton has an ever impressive pen game, and there's something about the way she writes that is so relatable and so warm, even when one is very different to her. I found Ghosts very funny and relatable, but ultimately quite sad.

This book truly spoke to me on every level.
Nina is an incredible character and I loved everything about her.

Being 40 and single myself...her every interaction with Katherine resonated with me so much. Her argument with her actually made me sob...as I too, have had that conversation in my head before.

Dating is so hard and you can tell Dolly Alderton has really gone through these experiences. Both Lola and Nina, really dated. They lived in this real awful world of being single in your 30s and even 40s.

Nina's conversation with Jethro also made me sob and feel so sad. Every word was truth. Men do not have a biological clock.

When they are in their 40s and 50s they can date women much younger....and the kind of men (note not all men of course) that they were dating are just appalling and yet their behaviour is still acceptable but that behaviour in us (specifically love bombing) would be met with horror on dates were it the other way around.

Dolly Alderton really gets it.

For every woman who has been love bombed or gas lit or ghosted (which is almost every woman who has dated for any length of time) this is your book. It will speak to you on every level and it will make you cry....but more importantly its soothing and reassuring...you have been heard and finally you are not alone. Dolly Alderton, Nina and Lola have been there and we are all doing okay still. 😍

Thanks to the author, publisher and Netgalley for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Following the success of Dolly Aldterton’s 2018 memoir, Everything I Know About Love, it’s not surprising that she’s decided to put everything she knows about dating to use for a novel. Co-host of the popular podcast The High Low, former dating columnist and current agony aunt for The Sunday Times, Alderton has established herself as somewhat of an authority on millennial dating patterns and modern love. Her debut novel, Ghosts, is a thoughtful and entertaining depiction of the common pitfalls of online dating, and navigating friends and family relationships in your thirties.
Nina Dean is a successful food writer and journalist in her early thirties. With a thriving career, her own London apartment and a collection of committed friends Nina’s life is anything but empty. While her thirty-second birthday is a low-key party with close friends, what follows is the strangest year of her life. After a brief attempt at online dating, Nina meets the charming Max on a dating app and they quickly develop a relationship.
Following a whirlwind few weeks, Nina finds herself the victim of one of the most notorious crimes of modern dating - ghosting. Max draws away quickly and without explanation, and is soon ignoring all of Nina’s attempts at contacting him. Rather than treating this development as an opportunity for romantic comedy, Alderton’s illustration of the impact of a sudden and unexplained ending to an intense relationship is realistic and heartfelt. She underlines that the modern manners of online dating aren’t just entertainment fodder, and that the experience of a partner choosing to cut off all contact is deeply unsettling and hurtful.
The Ghosts title doesn’t just address the modern dating phenomenon of ghosting, it also refers to the fading memory of Nina’s father as he succumbs to the effects of Alzheimer’s disease. Alderton’s illustration of the impact this has on Nina and her mother, and the painful loss of shared memories with a loved one, is compassionate and considered. This element of the novel provides a thoughtful counterbalance to the more mainstream cultural issues of dating and friendships, and is another example of how the book succeeds in balancing light-hearted entertainment with empathy and insight.
Explorations of online dating and friendship dynamics might sound like well-trodden territory for a young, contemporary author; but Alderton is able to elevate these issues with perceptive remarks on modern relationships. As well as being an enjoyable read, Ghosts is cut through with some incisive observations, and Nina’s sharp commentary on the politics of dating is both laugh out loud funny and unnervingly accurate. Between guiltily reflecting on why a “sprinkling of the patriarchy” feels so good when it comes to dating, and observing that “being a heterosexual woman who loved men meant being a translator for their emotion”, her quick comments are entertaining without being preachy.
She also captures some of the misconceptions and conflicts of friendships with an impressive level of wit and awareness. Nina’s friendships are wide-ranging and rich, without being penned in by some of the performative aspects of female friendship and “girl-gang feminism - the groups of female friends who...exhibited moral superiority from simply having a weekly brunch with each other”. Her close friendship with long-term singleton Lola, could easily have become a cliched sidekick storyline full of cheap laughs - but Alderton portrays both Lola and Nina with authenticity and tact.
At times there are some easy routes taken to tie up some of the drama. An abrupt night of passion between Nina and an unexpected partner feels bit like an excuse to include a sex scene with no emotional stakes. Her confrontation of a friend’s ex-boyfriend for his disappearing act seems overly neat, even if it does fulfil the revenge fantasies of a lot of loyal friends. But overall, Ghosts is an impressive fiction debut, full of compelling and truthful observations about the trials of modern life and relationships.

A book that I think most people my age (late 20s early 30s) will relate to and enjoy. Didn't enjoy it as much as her non-fiction, but I did enjoyed it enough that I would read more of her fiction.

An enjoyable fiction that fans of Dolly are likely to enjoy - keep on mind it is obviously very different from her non fiction though

I enjoyed this book and the story. Not my favourite but still very enjoyable. I hope the author writes more fiction

A sweet and charming story that will appeal to millennials and anyone who has ever tried to navigate life and life in a big city.

I've tried to get into Ghosts several times and unfortunately this just isn't for me. The writing style is great, but there's just something about the storyline that isn't gripping me as I thought it would!

An enjoyable read about the single life of two thirty something women. The perils of dating sites, ageing parents and married friends.

Having absolutely loved Dolly's non-fiction book Everything I Know About Love, I was really excited to hear she was writing a novel. Unfortunately, this book was a huge disappointment.
The main character was dull and unlikeable and the writing style was just not up to par. The gimmicky metaphors and clunky and predictable story line made it really difficult to read.

This is the author’s first foray into fiction and I really hope it won’t be her last.

This book is funny and really relatable and you don’t have to be a single woman on her 30s to feel that way……I’m certainly not anymore. This is a really well observed and well written debut. Impressive.

I was all hyped up to really love this book after seeing so many fab reviews but unfortunately it didn’t quite ring any bells for me. I mean there were parts of it that I really loved, Nina’s Dad’s dementia journey was really touching and it felt so real. You really did want to reach into the book and give them all a massive hug, especially nearer the end of the book. It’s such a cruel illness but this book shines a light on the support that is out there and highlights looking for the bright star in a dark sky.

It was the relationship with Max that didn’t feel quite right to me, I still can’t quite put my finger on it but I felt like I was reading Nina’s diary entries and struggled to get drawn into the relationship like I normally would.

The ending of the book also kinda jumped up on me, I was happily reading along and then bam, that was the end and it still felt like I had another few chapters yet.

On another positive though Nina’s relationship with her mum and her friends was so realistic, it’s true how we grow apart from each other as life takes its toll but having friends that you know you can count on when things go down the pan really does help. Lola was like this for Nina, I loved their relationship and found myself chuckling along at the hen do - oh how awkward that must have felt!

Overall an ok book, I liked it and enjoyed the characters but it just felt a bit flat and didn’t grab me as I was expecting it to - maybe I’d hyped it up a bit too much before hand…

Finished this in a day! I loved the main character and found her so relatable. This was well written and an easy quick read.