Really Good, Actually
by Monica Heisey
Pub Date: January 17, 2023
William Morrow
Thanks to the author, Publisher, and NetGalley for the ARC of this book.
I found this book to be horribly depressing and I will not be recommending it to anyone. Although the quoted reviews say it is.....
Laugh-out-loud funny and filled with sharp observations, Really Good, Actually is a tender and bittersweet comedy that lays bare the uncertainties of modern love, friendship, and our search for that thing we like to call “happiness”. This is a remarkable debut from an unforgettable new voice in fiction.

Not the book for me. I'm going back to my Christmas Novels.
2 stars

Really Good, Actually details the year following Maggie's separation from her husband. I found this hard to read at times. I found Maggie very unlikeable.

A funny, sharp, and very clever novel about moving on after a break-up and re-learning what it is to be yourself.

Margaret's life is heading in a direction she never expected, her marriage is over and she doesn't know how to handle it. She isn't happy about it and doesn't know how to do it and she takes out her angst on and alienates everyone in her life. A story of finding a way to survive the unimaginable and find yourself in the process.

I don't understand how all 3 quoted reviews on the main page for this use the word "hilarious." This book was completely depressing. Sold as a chick lit style book, it was not light hearted or enjoyable in any way, let alone "laugh out loud" funny. I finished it last night and I'm still sad. I'm sorry but I would not recommend this to anyone.

Sometimes you read a synopsis and you just know a book is for you. This is how I felt when I read the description of Really Good, Actually. I've been in a reading slump recently and only reading what really appeals to me. This book had me hooked from page one. It was funny and ridiculous and healing. It felt modern, too, in a way that made me feel fuzzy inside. The inclusion of Maggie's "group chat" was perfect and kept me laughing with relatability. From the peril of trying to unlock your phone screen with your nose in cold weather to referring to one of two Laurens as "Emotional Lauren," I had a great time reading this.

This is a hilarious read while also being the most accurate portrayal of heartbreak I've ever read. If you are a millennial who has ever felt like you were going crazy after a bad breakup, I absolutely recommend reading this.

A laugh out loud, can't believe it's a debut, must-read! Looking forward to reading more from this author.

Unfortunately DNFd this one. With the way the blurb was written and the character and author name being so similar I thought this was a memoir for an embarrassingly long time. Also I was told there would be humor and I did not find a trace of that

A solid 4.75 stars for me, maybe 5 stars if I think about it longer.

Really Good, Actually covers a lot of deep topics through a lens of, at times, uncomfortable relatability and laugh-out-loud humor. We follow Maggie, a 29-year-old academic who is going through a divorce from the man she's spent the majority of her romantic life with up until that point. It doesn't help that, in the split, he took their cat with him.

I found the writing of this book to be pretty fantastic. It was so funny from start to finish, and even the unlikeable parts (of which there are quite a few) of our main character were tolerable for me because I wanted to see if she would succeed. I thought the commentary on these modern times, feminism, and women's roles in relationships and society were all clear-sighted and brutally honest. I thought Maggie was written as a beautifully, frustratingly complex main character that I all-at-once felt for and also wanted to shake. There are also some interesting takes on friendships. and dealing with depression, anxiety, and trauma that I thought were really important. What are healthy expectations of friends (and work colleagues, etc.) in situations such as these? What borders as toxic positivity? How does that reflect how today's society handles depressed and anxious people in a bigger sense?

This is probably one of my favorite reads of 2022, and I think Monica Heisey did a wonderful job on this one. It's sarcastic, biting, so funny, and relatable for anyone in their late 20s/early 30s. It won't be everyone's 5-star read, but it was definitely a close one for me.

A very relatable book that I can't say I necessarily enjoyed (hit a little close to home - ha) but found important. Not enough is said about how hard your late 20's/early 30's are and this explored that well.

I received an ARC of this novel from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

A young woman goes through a divorce that challenges her view of the world. She struggles, mourns, makes poor choices, and detonates sons bridges along the way. This is a raw read that manages to be humorous simultaneously.

Thank you to Netgalley and William Morrow for this early digital copy in exchange for a review.

Maggie is reeling from the discovery that her marriage, which only lasted 608 days, is going to end in divorce. But she is fine! She is stuck at a job she doesn't love and is questioning how she ended up there in the first place with very little money to her name. But she is doing great really! So what if she is only 29 and is someone's soon to be ex wife? She is ready to take charge of her life.

She now has time to explore who she is on her own, what type of sex she likes and what time of day she likes to eat her burgers (4 am). She is discovering who she is through tough love from her work peers and her best friends in their group chat. Meeting new friends along the way and taking up MANY hobbies to see what sticks.

Really Good, Actually is unlike any book I have ever read and related to. It feels as if Monica Heisey took over my life for a day to write the character of Maggie. It catapulted me back to my early 20s, friends I kept, bars we would frequent, the ever present pop cultural references. The emotions that were able to be captured through this storytelling while also giving me big belly laughs and occasional tears is something that is very rare to find in a book. I felt every big emotion Maggie felt that first year alone. Life is hard with a lot of big complicated feelings and I think this story captures the messiness of it all so wonderfully.

Voicey, engaging, and all too relatable. A recommended purchase for collections where women's fiction and lighter lit fic is popular.

I really enjoyed this book. It had me laughing in so many places and also, a lump in my throat at others. Maggie’s life is so typical of what it is to be single in this world, especially after being “dumped”. I love the lessons she learns and the relationships she has along the way. Good ending!

Oy, another novel about the dissolution of a marriage and the rebuilding of a young life. This same story of angst and disbelief is all too common among young novelists. This novel was incredibly predictable and reminiscent of so many recent novels.

Though there was a certain level of charm at the start, I was soon bored by the retelling of another story of divorce. I couldn’t relate to the young protagonist. It just seems that a divorce after a college romance and short marriage isn’t enough to create an engaging novel.

Thank you Netgalley for this ARC.