Unfortunately I couldn’t get into this book because I didn’t enjoy any of the characters! I thought the premise was promising, but ultimately I struggled.

Kind of a heavier read than I expected!
I did love how all 3 of the main girls were so different, yet so similar in relation to self-esteem & views of themselves. It mirrors real life SO well, because women always feel like the grass is greener, yet the women we envy often think the same way we do about ourselves.

This has got to be my new favorite book. I love a good romance, but the feeling of empowerment that these three women gave me was so much better. They showed true power and the raw side of every woman's life. They tore down the walls of perfection and they were messy. They were far from perfect and that's what I loved about them. Joy, Annie, and Celine will forever be held in my heart. I can't even think of how many people I've told about this book.

nsfw + conversations with friends + every millennial woman you've met in person and been like she needs to go to therapy
this is like the definition of millennial women's litfic but not written with any grace or understanding of what exactly makes it so alluring
the characters are all so infuriatingly useless and have no backbone whatsoever - joy grated every nerve in my body with her 'omg theoooooo' talk and sure that's the point but after the 19284th time i think i got the point pretty well
celine's perspective isn't balanced enough with the other two so it feels like an extreme afterthought on the author's part to be like "omg no i wrote about a not conventionally attractive white woman but i need to write about a conventionally attractive white woman's perspective too"
there are a few sections in this book that i felt flowed quite well - part 4 specifically, and the bits in annie's perspective when she talks about her work confidence and her shapeshifting for her boyfriend, but my god the rest of it was plodding and quirky and the ENDING was so,,,,
every person in this book needs extreme therapy and i feel like the author does too
also the way it felt like the author was using sexual harassment in the workplace as a metaphor for like,, women needing to break up with their lazy boyfriends was so weird and felt super icky to me to equate those two experiences
it's so WHITE too omg

Three women who believe in equality, but continually let the men in their lives walk all over them. While some of the story lines are relatable as a young woman, I found none of these women likeable. They all have very low self-esteem and none of them seem to value their female friendships at all.

Thank You NetGalley and Random House for the gifted e-galley.

This book is so relatable and will be a must read for millennial women. It's a slow pace to start, but you become invested in the characters and the tough conversations they have and the situations they find themselves in.

This wasn't the book I was expecting at all. I was hoping for something more light hearted and instead what I got was a lot of rambling meditations on women's bodies and the toxic thoughts and relationships a group of roommates have. It didn't flow well and I had a hard time getting invested in the characters to be perfectly honest. The writing was refreshingly honest and insightful but it wasn't a romcom by any means! Just not for me unfortunately and I DNF at 30%. Much thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to review an early digital copy.

This is another arc that didn't really hit the mark for me. I was not into it as much as I thought I would. Couldn't bring myself to care about the main characters and their stories. That's a bit disappointing because I found the plot of the book and its cover so interesting!

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for providing an eARC!

I swear I read this before the release date. I just completely forgot to write the review in time.

Our main characters are two roommates who are looking for a third roommate in order to offset costs. Joy is a thirty something fat woman working in HR she hasn’t had a lot of luck with dates or love. Annie is a thirty something average woman working in news who is in a long term supposedly committed relationship with her boyfriend. They throw their lists of prerequisites out the window when they meet Theo. He’s charming, and he’s funny, and he’s the perfect new best friend for them. Joy starts to fall for him and all chaos ensues when Theo brings home a girl, Celine. Celine is a thirty something model skinny woman who Joy immediately hates with a passion for coming between her and Theo.
One thing all these women have in common is hating their own bodies, hating other women for having “better” bodies than they do, and hating other women for being in relationships and in other stages of life. They also have a dogged desire to be seen by the men in their lives to the point that they’re bending over backwards and compromising their goals for them.
The book does have a good conclusion about what female solidarity is, but sure takes a good long time to get around to it. It also has a good message about being a woman who exists for yourself, not for the men in your lives.
I just didn’t enjoy most of the buildup to these messages and morals and wish there was more acceptance of body positivity or neutrality considering how a lot of the book was dedicated to women hating their bodies and going on diets and trying to lose weight.
I also wish there was more exploration with Annie’s discovery at her job and that there was a more satisfying conclusion to that plot point. Instead it was just left really open with nothing resolved in the end.
Overall though this was a fast and enjoyable read. It’s about falling out of love, and doing it well and for the right reasons

Friends and roommates Joy and Annie are disappointed to find that their thirties aren’t what they dreamed, and they’re still struggling to find love and pay the rent. They bring in a third roommate, the charming Theo, right before Annie’s boyfriend invites her to move in with him. It seems like fate might be bringing Joy and Theo together. But when Theo shows up with his beautiful girlfriend Celine, all three women must face why they’re willing to accept such terrible behavior from the men in their lives.

This book begs the question, "Are straight women alright?" And by the end, the answer seems to be a resounding NO. This is a thought-provoking, painfully relatable, and darkly funny testament to being a woman in your thirties. Each character brings her own complex bouquet of patriarchal trauma. I especially love how hard Jana Casale's beautiful prose hits, as well as how she plays with memory. I would simply like to suggest that these women try dating people who aren't men! I promise, it's great!

Thank you, Netgalley, for the ARC!

Okay, this cover … I’ve been staring at it ever since I got this ARC.

It was a really cool and heartfelt take on the many relationships with women as they tackle love, friendships, self-journeys, careers, and all around life. I like how they all had different pasts and plots that all intertwined with this apartment.

It mostly had a sad and somber tone to it. This book is quite heavy and deals with body issues a lot so it took me a while to get through. I’m still a bit younger than Joy and Annie, but I still found myself able to relate to a lot of their insecurities and issues. It was even interesting to see Celine’s POV given how we saw how Annie and Joy view her.

I kinda didn’t care about Theo despite the synopsis making it look like he’d be a bigger deal. Joy simped for him so hard and he wasn’t worth shit. It made me cringe at some points but it was a good read. Things like that made them all feel like real people.

They all need therapy, I’ll say that. And they all deserve so much better. It was inspiring to slowly see them becoming empowered within themselves.

Our three main characters Annie, Joy and Celine are all women in their early 30s doing figurative gymnastics for the men in their lives.

Throughout the book we see our characters (and some side characters) making themselves small so the men can feel big. At home, at work, in public, etc.

It’s frustrating as a reader because the mistakes are obvious to us, but it’s also relatable as I think most cishet women have done similar in relationships.

A bit spoilery beyond here.

We do get a delicious ending with the ladies choosing themselves and their own happiness at last. Without that, it would be a dreadful depressing story.

This was a very honest and sometimes downright brutal perspective from multiple women about how we think and feel and the challenges we face on a daily basis and our relationships. It often felt like stream of consciousness and although parts of it did make me feel a bit down, I found I could not stop reading. Thank you to Netgalley and The Dial Press for the ARC.

An enjoyable story about several young women who are trying to find their true love and in that chaotic search find themselves! Each of the characters comes to adulthood with ideas of who they should be to bring loved and what their boyfriend should be. In the end they all learn that the most important thing is to know who they are and be that person

How to Fall Out of Love Madly is the story of Joy, Annie, and Celine - 3 women struggling to figure out who they are and what their life is in their late 20s / early 30s. This is a sad book, but it was also nuanced, real, hopeful and full of love.

Thank you to Netgalley and Random House Publishing for the ARC - this book is out now!

HOW TO FALL OUT OF LOVE MADLY is a millennial version of BRIDGET JONES’ DIARY. I would love to play a game and see if there is a genre through the decades of ‘coming of age novels of young career women’ and name the books that fall within it. They wouldn’t all be romantic comedies but they would be aspirational and hopeful, as this book is. Women grappling with image issues, competition in the workplace and for romantic rivals and trying to find their independence, however briefly. This book falls squarely into the described category and doesn’t disappoint. I received my copy from the publisher through NetGalley.

I had the opportunity to read this novel as an ARC through NetGalley.

I was so excited when I read the Publisher's Marketplace description of this sale. It didn't live up to my expectations/hopes.

I would have loved to see more of Celine and less of Joy and Annie. I spent a lot of time wondering why Joy and Annie didn't just TALK to each other and actually be friends to each other. They both needed the other.

Tenses bounced around a lot, to the point of distraction (and sometimes within the same sentence); I wish it had been edited a bit better.

This was an interesting and introspective novel about three roommates whose roles keep shifting. Joy, Annie and Theo have had different configurations being roommates with one another and each time a change takes place, something shifts in terms of their relationships to one another, a reminder about the delicate nature of friendships and relationships. Theo’s new girlfriend, Celine, even gets her own POV. This is a character-driven novel, reminiscent of Sally Rooney, with perhaps less angst, but an interesting study in human nature and relationships. Thank you to Random House and Netgalley for the advanced review copy.

This was an interesting book and definitely one that grabbed my attention. I enjoyed how it all tied in together because through it I was wondering why I couldn't just read more about Joy who definitely was my favourite character of all of them. Definitely an interesting read and the cover is just gorgeous!

*I received a free ARC of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review*

A tale as old as time: millennial ennui. Unfortunately, while the writing was quite good and there were some highly relatable moments, this book ultimately fell flat for me. I found it hard to relate to or empathize with the characters, and that it leaned too hard into millennial stereotypes that ended up making the characters come off as mean and one-dimensional. I also found the discussions around body image highly triggering.

While I wanted to like this, I give it 3 stars for being well done but just not the book for me.