I went into this book expecting a rom-com based on the cover, but I don't think I'd call this a rom-com at all or honestly even a romance. While there is one, it's definitely in the background and secondary to Harriet's journey of coming to terms with the toxic relationships she has been in and how they have impacted her life. Harriet is a very likeable character and her predicament is a relatable one, and I especially liked that she then used her own experiences to help someone else from going down the same toxic path.

This is a book I had to be patient with though. I almost DNF'ed about 20% in because the story was slower to progress than I typically like. That entire 20% was centered mostly on a meal at an in between Harriet, her then boyfriend Jon and his obnoxious family. I guess maybe we were meant to feel like Harriet, that it was the longest, most uncomfortable meal ever, but it nearly put me off from continuing. I'm glad I did continue though because after that beginning, I quickly became invested in Harriet and the pages flew by so just keep in mind that the beginning is slow but that it's worth pushing through.

3.5 stars

Based on the cover, the blurb, and the genre bubbles on Goodreads, I was expecting this to be a rom-com. It is NOT. I think this book should come with a quick blurb at the beginning about toxic/emotionally abusive relationships. If I had known this was in the book I probably wouldn’t pick it up. Basically the main character leaves her boyfriend because he’s manipulative, moves in with a complete stranger, and then tries to help another ex-boyfriend’s current girlfriend by sending a letter about the emotional abuse he did to her and it blows up in her face. It was a pretty heavy subject to read through, especially when you don’t expect it and expect the book to be light and fluffy. The “couple” (her and her landlord) don’t even get together until 95% of the way through when they finally confess their feelings. So it is a HEA but not really a romance book.

I also didn’t enjoy reading this book. I think it might just have to do with the author’s writing style. I felt like I had to keep stopping and it just didn’t work for me.

Don’t think this is marketed/described correctly but not a bad book. Don’t know if I would recommend.

Wedding photographer Harriet ends her long term relationship when he unexpectedly proposes and she finds herself living with Cal, who ran out on his own wedding where she was the photographer. Both are dealing with continued drama from their exes while trying to carry on. A chance encounter at a wedding brings Harriet face to face with an abusive ex and his fiancee and she makes it her mission to save the fiancee from a lifetime of misery.

This is a book about growth. It is rightly marketed as a women’s fiction novel and follows Harriet as she starts the next chapter in her life while being constantly reminded of her past. While some aspects of the book felt very far-fetched, there were a lot of moments that just felt true. Life is messy and complicated and full of reminders of the past. I loved Harriet and Cal’s conversations because neither could ever quite say the right thing to each other in a way that just felt so real. I also loved that this book was set in Leeds, U.K. which is a charming city that is greatly underutilized in books. While not a romance, this book left things with an implied HEA which made me happy.

Thank you to Avon and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Mad About You
By Mhairi McFarlane
3.5/5

Harriet Hatley is a wedding photographer who has no interest in finding her own happy ever after. She's been burned too many times in previous relationships, and though she swears she's moved on, she's faced with personal and professional challenges when a figure from her past makes an unwelcome re-appearance. On top of all that, newly single Harriet is desperate for a place to live after moving out of her most recent ex's house, so she signs a lease to move in with Cal, a total stranger with a complicated past of his own.

The story started out a little predictable but the complete and utter shock by the characters about something I saw coming still made it pretty amusing 😂 I thought there would be more of a love story throughout the book, but as I read more about what Harriet had gone through in her past I understood why the romance plot wasn't the main focus. Also, I know I said it started out a bit predictable BUT there were some parts I was literally on the edge of my seat, chest pounding and rooting for this girl so hard!! Overall I did enjoy this book, and I'm looking forward to reading more by this author.

Read this if you love:
*Forced Proximity
*The Flatshare
*John Tucker Must Die
*more focus on character development than romance

Trigger Warnings:
Emotional abuse/abusive relationships, death of parent(s), cheating

Thank you Netgalley for the advanced copy in exchange for an honest review!

As always, Mhairi McFarlane delivers a beautifully written piece delving into the very serious issue of domestic abuse. I found it took me longer to read this novel due to the heavy topic and emotional gravity surrounding this topic. My favorite part of the novel was the ending (no spoilers revealed here!). Pick it up and happy reading!

I both loved and didn’t love this book. I loved Harriet’s journey of self discovery and found it to be beautiful and authentic. Her journey was remarkable and reading her walk to find herself was relatable and lovely. The characters were complex and interesting and I found their romance to be sweet. However, their romance was second fiddle to Harriets self discovery and didn’t feel necessary to the plot. It almost felt like a side plot that wasn’t necessary. There was a lot going on, and a lot of coincidences. Overall, a relatable journey with a side of sweet romance that felt a bit forced. 3.5 ⭐️

Women's Fiction

I really hate to call this book Women's fiction, (I, personally, hate that moniker), but it is so much more than a romance.

Harriet breaks up with her boyfriend when he proposes to her in front of his family. He knew she didn't want to get married and he manipulated her into a situation where she felt she had to say yes. She was living with him and is forced to find new accomodations. One of her best friends sets her up with a man looking to rent out a room. Harriet accepts the situation based on pictures of the home and a phone call with the owner.

A few weeks later she moves in. Right away she realizes this will be a dreadful mistake. The owner, Cal, is the runaway groom from a wedding where she was hired to take pictures. To top it off, she runs into another ex boyfriend at another wedding. Harriet recognizes the look on his girlfriend's face and decides to do something about it. Harriet was emotionally abused by this ex and writes a letter to the new girlfriend. This girlfriend shares the letter with Harriet's ex and he sets out to destroy Harriet's reputation.

While Harriet is dealing with the damage to her reputation, she and Cal are becoming friends. She learns he isn't the guy she first thought he was and in fact she really likes him. Ultimately, this book is a romance so love wins, the evildoer is vanquished and all is well.

McFarlane tackles some pretty big topics here and is largely successful. The emotional abuse isn't treated lightly and the romance between Harriet and Cal develops slowly and in a realistic way. This was so much more than a romance, it was simply a great book.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for my ARC of this novel.

Mad About You is a typical Mhairi McFarlane novel – funny, sweet, filled with fanciful characters handling their fairly heavy problems with a light heart, lots of wit, and more than a little bit of humor.

When we first meet Harriet Hatley, the most in-demand wedding photographer in Leeds, the groom has just done a runner at the wedding she is shooting. Harriet offers emotional support to best-man Sam as he musters up the courage to meet the bride at the limo and watches as he gets punched in the face for being the bearer of bad news. Harriet never met the husband (not)-to-be, but she knows one thing for sure – the man is a real jerk not only for destroying what should have been one of the happiest days of the bride’s life but for leaving his friend to face the music alone.

Moments like this – as well as the high divorce rate and her own past – are why Harriet “doesn’t believe in romance, loathes the idea of marriage, and thinks chocolate fountains are an abomination”. Facts she has made abundantly clear to her boyfriend Jon, with whom she has been in a relationship for two years. So when he proposes at his obnoxious parents’ fortieth wedding anniversary celebration, she is livid. She goes through with the charade, not wanting to embarrass him in front of his loved ones, but breaks up with him once they return to their hotel room. After an awkward night sharing a bed with a man with whom she wishes she had never shared anything at all, and several even more awkward interminable days living in his house, she moves into a stranger’s home, sight unseen. Literally. She doesn’t meet with the man and does nothing more than glance through the pictures of the room he has for rent.

Cal Clarke, for reasons I never quite understood, is desperate for a decent roommate after his last renter treated their home like a nudist colony. When Harriet moves in with her four small bags of stuff he is relieved to find her almost normal. Until his best friend Sam shows up. That’s when the three of them put two and two together and realize a few things. One, Cal is the groom who absconded from his upscale nuptials, and two, there is no way that Cal and Harriet will ever be comfortable living together.

Only they are. After a few cumbersome moments, Cal and Harriet discover they make not just decent roommates but fairly good companions. They have a shared sense of humor. They like each other’s friends. They enjoy each other’s company. Bonhomie flows easily between them, which isn’t surprising since they are both easy-going, laid-back people who prefer a comfortable but low-key lifestyle that lets them concentrate on their jobs, friends, and family while minimizing the drama in their lives.

But both of them also have pasts that are determined to stay in the present. Cal’s ex keeps making visits to their home, determined to win him back. Jon continues to pursue Harriet. And then the monster Harriet has been trying to forget for years waltzes back into her life and she has to decide if she is willing to put everything she has built on the line to handle him in a permanent manner or if she’s going to chuck it all and run from her problems once again.

This story is very much women’s fiction, and rather than dealing with finding Mr./Ms. Right, it primarily deals with what happens when you find Mr./Ms. Wrong. It’s obvious from the get-go that neither Cal nor Harriet are good at romantic relationships. Cal has a type called Hot Thatcher – “Margaret Thatcher’s personality in the body of a babe” – which seems to mean he falls for girls who are caustic, overly assertive, domineering, lying, cheating beauties. Harriet is drawn to men who are extreme emotional dependents (Jon) or abusers.

Adding to the difficulty is that neither of these two seems to have a clue as to how to deal effectively with problems in a relationship. This means their problem people tend to stick around longer than necessary, adding (hilarious) hardships to their lives. While the author uses her usual charm and humor to tell us of their foibles and difficulties I will admit that the laughter didn’t keep me from realizing Ms.McFarlane was building a relationship between two people who should probably see a therapist for a few years before being with anyone again.

Fortunately, even if they can’t pick great partners, Cal and Harriet do have wonderful taste in friends. They not only have a terrific #budmance with each other, they have other solid pals in their lives. Lorna, Harriet’s bestie, is a delightfully droll, slightly looney, and often laugh-out-loud funny sidekick, and Sam, Cal’s close buddy, is sweet and charming. All four characters have a sunny-side-up take on life which makes the book a fun and easy read. Even as the narrative deals with some hard issues, it remains a jolly tale because most everyone in it is a delightfully light-hearted comical individual.

Which is surprising given that a good third of the story is about a manipulative emotional abuser and the women who fall for him. The author does a terrific job of laying out the mind games these individuals play with their victims and how gaslighting is such a subtle form of torture that those experiencing it are often utterly miserable without being able to explain why. This part is handled extremely well – it is funny enough that it doesn’t weigh the book down and serious enough that it tackles the issue with the sobriety it deserves. However, if this is a trigger issue for you at all, this might not be the novel for you. There is an excellent resolution, but to get there we have to do a bit of a deep dive into the problem.

The ‘romance’ in the story reads more like a friends-with-benefits scenario and doesn’t move even that far until the last twenty percent or so of the book. I suppose, if one were inclined to be generous, they could take the friendship buildup as the foreplay for the relationship but it’s so clearly them just bonding as pals, with no real undercurrent of sexual tension, that it doesn’t feel like the groundwork for a courtship. Maybe it’s all the emphasis on the failed relationships that make this feel like a no-go as a love story, but whatever the cause I didn’t ship Harriet and Cal.

I love Mhairi McFarlane’s work and am always happy to read anything she writes. However if you enter Mad About You looking for a romance – which the cover and title would seem to indicate – you are probably destined for disappointment. If you’re in the mood for some amusing woman’s fiction, though, definitely pick it up.

I went into this book completely blind, no surprise there. I thought I was going to be reading a light and fluffy romcom, but I was wrong. It starts off really good filled with plenty of laugh out loud moments then it delved off to the more serious topic covering toxic relationships.

The two main characters were amazing and I really enjoyed them both. My disappointment in this book was there was barely any romance. I wanted and needed to read more about Cal and Harriet. But instead, McFarlane really dived more into Harriet's personal growth and overcoming her past mistakes. This is definitely more of a women's fiction than a romance in my opinion.

Mad About You
⭐️⭐️⭐️/5

Harriet is a wedding photographer with zero desire to ever tie the knot.

So when her longtime boyfriend Jon blindsides her with a (very public) proposal, she accepts out of sheer embarrassment only to break it off with him later that evening.

Seeing as she’s been living with Jon, she needs a new place to live, immediately. Putting her in the en suite of Cal Clarke’s home.

I desperately wanted to give this book more stars, but while I loved Hattie’s character, I just couldn’t get into the story. More focused on character emotional growth than romance, this is a great story for someone who isn’t really looking for a rom com. I loved Hattie’s relationship with her friends and appreciated her strength having overcome quite a few hardships in her life!

While I did appreciate the romantic angle with Cal, I did feel that the relationship arc was very rushed with little (arguably no) build-up. The story focused very heavily on past relationships which is totally great, if that’s what you’re looking for!

I did enjoy reading this book, it was just missing a few key things I look for in contemporary romance!

Thank you NetGalley and HarperCollins/Harper Fiction for the eARC in exchange for an honest review!

Thank you to NetGalley and Avon Books for providing the ARC.

Mhairi McFarlane is an interesting author. Her books focus more about life and character growth with a bit of romance sprinkled in. Mad About You is no different, but perhaps a bit more in tune with the romance side of things.

Harriet dumps her long-term boyfriend after he proposes to her, and finds herself moving in with Cal, who has his own relationship problems to deal with. While this book may seem like you're getting set up for a fun, adorable rom com, it never quite reaches that level.

McFarlane's prose is refreshing and authentic, and Harriet is truly a fantastic character, with realistic flaws and growth. Her story is poignant and heartfelt, and you can't help but be drawn into her world. While I wish there was more of a focus on the romance with Cal, I am not disappointed about the lack of it. And the book itself deals with a lot of heavy themes that you wouldn't necessarily find in a rom com.

Overall, an excellent addition to the Women's Fiction genre.

Harriet is a wedding photographer who never wants to get married. Cal has run from the altar of his own wedding. When a chance circumstance makes them roommates, this duo go from being strangers to roommates to friends.

But in true Mhairi McFarlane style, that's not the story. The deeper story is about women in toxic relationships, and how they find the courage to leave. How women stand by their friends in moments like this, when they know the relationship isn't right, and try to help them regardless of the blow back. It's a great story about women who lift other women up, and following the girl code. Mad About You is probably my favourite of hers to date.

Mhairi McFarlane delivers a fantastic grumpy sunshine romance that grabbed me start to finish. Her writing is brilliant and her characters always have great chemistry. Overall the pacing and atmosphere of the novel was very good. The story was charming, witty, entertaining. Highly recommend

I am such a fan of Mhairi McFarlane’s writing and this book was really good! There were some really heavy topics in this one with a dash of romance and humor. The main characters were likable and I enjoyed reading their interactions with one another. Harriet has a history filled with loss, gaslighting, and betrayal that has kept her guarded of her heart and we first meet her during a very awkward weekend away in which she makes a difficult choice to move on from her current relationship. We see many highs and lows with Harriet and I loved her growth throughout the story in which she gains back she power and ability to open up. Cal is such a well-written male lead and he was such a sweetheart. I loved his and Harriet’s conversations and how they were able to talk about difficult things with one another. The coming together of the women later on in the story was so fun and you could feel the black cloud surrounding Harriet and her past lift. It was pure magic!

Harriet Hatley is a wedding photographer who doesn’t want to get married. She’s been to a lot of weddings and seen a lot of things. Many of them are beautiful celebrations. Others, not so much. Like the wedding where she had taken the photos of the bride and bridesmaids getting ready, only to get to the venue and find out that the groom is gone. His best man Sam told Harriet right before the bride arrived, and she left soon after that, but not before hearing the shriek of pain from when Sam told the bride and she hit him.

Harriet has told her boyfriend Jon that she doesn’t want to get married, and she thinks she’s been heard. But when they are at a posh hotel celebrating his parents’ anniversary, he proposes at the family dinner, making her feel trapped into saying yes. Harriet waits until they’re back in their hotel room before yelling at him for setting her up like that, and for proposing after she had specifically said she didn’t want to get married.

Once they’re back home in Leeds, Harriet starts looking for a new place to live. Jon offers to let her stay as long as she wants—his house is certainly big enough for both of them, but she’s not comfortable there, especially when she realizes he’s still trying to win her back. So when her friend Roxy, a real estate agent, finds her an ideal place to live, she jumps at it.

It’s not until Harriet moves her stuff into Cal Clarke’s room to let that she bumps into his friend Sam and realizes that Cal is the runaway groom. Not that Harriet is looking for romance, but it’s good to know that she has valid reasons to keep this good looking guy at arm’s length.

As the weeks go by, Harriet tries to heal from her breakup with Jon and bond with her friends again. But a wedding she is hired to photograph brings up an even uglier former relationship than the one with Jon. Her emotionally abusive ex is, ironically, the best man, and when Harriet sees the look on the face of his fiancée in a guarded moment, she knows that history is repeating itself. And she wants to help.

But when Harriet reaches out, she finds that her business, her reputation, and even her emotional well-being are under attack. Will she be able to find the healing she needs to move forward with her life and find love, or has the damage been too much for her?

Mad About You is the latest love story from international bestselling author Mhairi McFarlane. It’s romantic, and it’s comedic, but to call it a rom com would be to greatly undersell it. This is the story of female friendship and solidarity. It’s the story of healing from abuse. It’s the full story of relationships, not the just the meet cute through to the engagement, or to the wedding, or to the breakup. It’s the story of what comes after, the games and the resentment and the lies and the desperation. It’s about moving on and healing and finding the courage to face your worst secrets. And it’s about falling in love.

I have been buying McFarlane’s books for years but haven’t made the time to read them. That mistake is on me because Mad About You is phenomenal. These characters are fully drawn and emotionally intelligent. Harriet has made mistakes, but she has paid for them and learned from them. Watching her journey from an unhappy relationship to healing to happiness is such a joy. This is one of those books I wanted to linger in but also wanted to race through to find out what happened. If you’ve been looking for a rom com filled with intelligence, sophistication, honesty, and toast, then Mad About You may be just the book you’re looking for.

Egalleys for Mad About You were provided by Avon through NetGalley, with many thanks.

I got half way through this book and honestly got bored. I think maybe it is a case of me and not the book. I was expecting more rom com through out rather than just the beginning and I feel like the book diverged into a different story half way through. Despite that, I will definitely recommend it to others to try!

This book wasn’t what I was expecting and I’m still sad about that. I had a hard time finishing because of that.

Thank you NetGalley For the eARC in exchange for an honest review

This is my first book by Mhairi McFarlane, and I liked it, but it is a lot heavier than I expected. I tend to stay away from emotional books and try and keep things light. I think sometimes animated covers can be deceiving, but the bright colors, and the synopsis I was expecting a fun romcom with two people who's lives have turned upside down and are finding a way back to themselves & each other. Rather, I'd say this is pretty heavy and emotional. While I respect the storyline and touching on tough topics, I expected something different. Mhariri's writing is beautiful, and she's a fantastic storyteller, so if you don't mind heavier books, then I'd recommend you check this out.

3.5 stars, rounded up.
This was not what I expected. After absolutely loving Mhairi's last book, I had high hopes that this would be similar, with both heart and humor. While it starts out with some funny bits, it gets rather heavy and serious quickly and stays that way throughout. The romance is almost nonexistent and this focuses a great deal on Harriet and her past relationships. While it was empowering to watch as she finally moves through some really difficult things, it just didn't hit right for me and I kept waiting for the story to get better.

*gaslighting, closed door, strong language

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for my e-arc of this book. All opinions here are my own.

This was a really good book, with a lot of emotional parts to it. I would suggest having a tissue ready while reading, because you probably will cry at least once. Overall, I would definitely recommend this novel!

I received an e-ARC from the publisher.