Despite being a few years younger than the protagonist, I understood her aimlessness. Life is complicated, and most of us have no idea where we’re going, especially those of us who weren’t born into wealth. However, I feel the description of the book does not fit the actual plot. I went in expecting a thriller and mostly got a character study. I enjoy character studies, of course, but you can’t promise me surreal and then not deliver. Nothing particularly strange happens, with Bryce or anyone/anything else, until over halfway through the book. At this point in both my life and my literary journey, I’m used to male shenanigans, so none of his prior red flags fazed me. In addition, El’s ending felt like it came out of nowhere, and I didn’t understand how her back-and-forth character development throughout the book led to that point.

Nothing in the book gripped me, and I found that the plot began to lose me towards the end. I found myself more excited to finally finish it and be able to read something else than to see how the story ended.

Man's Best Friend was a book that really hits home when you feel as though you are striving to achieve something and missing the step. It's a very poignant book for anyone who has ever struggled in NYC, toggling between who you are and who you want to be. Moreso, what you're willing to do to get where you want to go.

Ok so I really struggled with this book. It was confusing and all the characters were not likable. & the FMC was annoying imo. She’s the narrator so that was a huge meh for me.

The plot points that focused on dogs….why? It’s confusing and throws everything off so much. I don’t get it. Don’t get me wrong I love the dog/owner relationship but it didn’t make sense the way it’s brought up and done here and takes away from the book.

This was a 2.5 star book but I rounded up. Thank you to NetGalley for an ARC of Man's Best Friend in exchange for an honest review.

Maybe a controversial take but I LOVE me a mean, bitter, directionless protagonist. A late-twenties working class New Yorker who has recently given up on a career in acting, El's resentment towards life and her fabulously wealthy friends is never not simmering near the surface. She is scathing in her internal assessment of the world and the people in her life, slowly losing friends as she succumbs to the "love-bombing" of an unsettling man in her new relationship.

It is nice to follow noble protagonists, and certainly much easier to root for and sympathize with their actions. However, there is something refreshing and cathartic getting to watch someone heedlessly pursue their worse impulses, a character archetype which is easy to dislike but ironically honest in their uncompromising assessment of an unjust world (see Emma Cline's The Guest for another example of this done slightly more expertly).. Very few, if any, characters in this book do not contain severe and uncomfortable flaws. I was especially compelled by Lytle's commentary on virtue signaling and the hypocrisy of the elite throughout he characters of El's NYU classmates and former friends.

I was also not expecting this to take a sharp turn into thriller territory: minding spoilers but I enjoyed slowly starting to piece together what was going on with Bryce and his obsessive love of El. Lytle did a good job of capturing the dangers of ignoring small red flags early on in relationships, and the snowball effect of desperation leading to ignorance and ultimately passive acceptance. The book lost a few stars for me on account of a heavy & ultimately clumsy dog metaphor (see title) that never really landed and felt out of place whenever it was shoehorned into the story: I understand what the author was getting at but it never felt subtle enough to be meaningful and the inclusion of the few chapters from dog(?) perspective could easily have been taken out.

usually i love insufferable main characters but they have to be done in a way that moshfegh does it... this fell flat for me and was not as enjoyable as i would have hoped for.

This was a pretty quick read but I had mixed feelings about it. Bryce really didn’t seem that bad and a lot of El’s responses to his behavior didn’t seem to fit the situation. El isn’t really a likable character but you also don’t hate her. She’s just a little bit boring. Her personal felt confusing - she was supposed to be the sad single 30 year old who gave up her dream of being an actor but was also described as confident and independent. It felt contradictory. The introduction of her 2 sets of friends from college and middle school didn’t really flow and felt clunky. The parts about her dreams weren’t necessary and the ending gave you nothing.

El was insufferable. I get that was probably the point, but it made this book extremely unenjoyable. Quite an anticlimactic ending. Felt unsatisfying

Man's Best Friend does the unlikable main character trope right - I'm relieved I'm not friends with this girl, but her POV was engaging and reasonably understandable even in her most brutal moments. El has what feels like a terminal case of Millennial Drifting Through Life With No Purpose Disease with a side of Are The Straights Okay?! but I also don't NOT relate to her whole vibe as I've also given up careerist dreams without replacing them with anything else in particular.

The mystery/thriller aspect of this book is really what shines as El goes down the rabbit hole to find out exactly what the hell is wrong with her new boyfriend even as she entwines herself further and further into his life. It was refreshing to read a book in this genre without the typical domestic thriller protagonist (woman, married to some guy, has a couple kids, somehow younger than me despite acting like what I think "middle-aged" is supposed to mean), and I appreciated that El got to just kind of suck at life even as you root for her to somehow win this one. I'll pop a couple spoilers in my Goodreads review since I can't tag them here, but overall I found this a satisfying read and I was happy to see something like this done differently than usual.

My thanks to Penguin Group Putnam and NetGalley for the ARC.

I really wanted to like this, on the premise alone. Unfortunately, the execution fell a little flat. The story begins with a snippet from the perspective of a dog, running away. Though that did end up coming full circle, every time this cropped up, I felt a little removed from the story being told. Ultimately, the narrator, as well as the surrounding characters, weren't ones I could enjoy spending time with. Everyone felt like a less fleshed out version of someone from Gossip Girl.
I really appreciate the opportunity and hope this book finds its readers!

I didn't think this book was for me. I couldn't connect and didn't like the writing style. El ignored too many red flags for me.

I enjoyed this book but thought at times the author was really stretching to make the title of Man's Best Friend relevant to the story at all. The entire plot about dogs running away was silly, didn't fit in and should have been scraped. If that piece had been gone, it would have been what it was, a just fine thriller.
Honestly, I was hoping it was going to go really dark and have someone being kept as a dog but I am a horror reader so that would have made this book stand out.

I was initially confused when I started to read Man's Best Friend, the start of the book starts in the midwest and the perspective is from a dogs point of view. The story is about a fail actress and her desire to go from rags to riches. Throughout the story dogs are loosely tied in and towards the end of the story it comes full circle, but it was very loose.

I really struggled with this book. We follow El, who went to NYU to study acting but now that she's hit 30 she has given up, as she isn't landing any roles. She seems to spend most of her time being jealous of her friends for being more wealthy and successful than she is. Then, at her friend Julia's party, she meets Bryce and her life takes a turn.

A large part of why I didn't like this book is because El is so unlikeable as a character, so if you're fine with unlikeable narrators you may enjoy this book more than I did. El is just kind of floating through life, defining herself entirely based on the people she's around. She's a terrible friend, and doesn't take accountability for it. When it came to the more thriller-ey aspects of the book I really should have been more concerned for her welfare, but I didn't care enough about her as a character to be concerned.

Like I said, if you're a fan of an unlikeable protagonist you'll probably enjoy this book a lot more than I did, it just wasn't my cup of tea.

This was such a great, suspenseful thriller! I couldn't put this book down and I would love to read more by this author. You'll never guess the twist at the end!

I really thought I was going to enjoy this when I started. However, as the story continued, I stopped. The story line was just a little confusing and wasn’t at all what I thought going into it from the description. The MC was not at all relatable and I found her to be a little whiny. And they way it ended kinda left me with a bad feeling, like I needed to shower.

book review • Man's Best Friend by Alana Biden Lytle • ☆☆☆☆☆ • Pub Date: May 14th, 2024

This review has been a long time coming. I finished this egalley a while ago, but I have been turning it over and over in my head ever since...

This book is about a young failed actress working in a bakery in New York City who decides to attend the birthday party of an old private school friend. It is there that she becomes increasingly enamored with the wealth and lifestyle of her friends. When a wealthy man finds her driver's license at the party and shows interest in her, she goes out with him, despite his glaring red flags and the fact that she has absolutely no interest in him. The book gets darker and darker, challenging the reader's stomach as it challenges the narrator's morals.

Alana B. Lytle's writing expertly satirizes the problematic aspects of the contemporary dating scene. This book eloquently attends to and challenges gendered power dynamics, the problem of codependency, vulnerability (especially the lack thereof), and underdevelopment of self—an enthralling exploration of love and it's intersections with power and ethics. It genuinely felt as though I was reading an overdramatized characterization of attachment styles, the narrator's being avoidant, and her love interest's being anxious. This book will keep you utterly enthralled while making you feel vaguely sick, and you'll love every second of it. I especially loved the complete power shift towards the end, it was surpsing in a sickeningly exciting way.

Thank you to NetGalley and G. P. Putnam's Sons for the advanced readers' copy of this title!

This novel had great potential and an intriguing premise. Unfortunately it was poorly executed and lacked cohesion.. It felt like a first draft.

Thank you to NetGalley for an ARC of Man's Best Friend.

I liked the title more than I did the book.

El is a failed actress looking for something...but what that is she's not sure.

When she meets a mysterious man named Bryce, she's quickly drawn into his privileged world, but when she discovers his secrets, she has to make a choice about her future and what she really wants in life.

El is not a likable character; she's not witty or charming, smart or clever.

But she's honest about her complacency, about her desire to do less, sacrificing her morals and values for a life of leisure.

The narrative was boring, tedious, filled with bratty privileged people hooking up, boozing, doing drugs, trying to sound smarter than they really are by debating whatever hashtag is trending on social media.

The story is neither suspenseful or compelling; this is not a mystery or thriller so much as whiny people whining about how hard life is while they dash off to the Hamptons or Paris and guzzle thousands in booze and snort thousands in drugs up their nose.

Bryce is pathetic, a loser, and not surprisingly, a good match for El.

I accept El's reason for accepting Bryce's marriage proposal though the ending wouldn't work if Bryce wasn't a loser.

But then, people have gotten married for less.

Thank you NetGalley, Alana B. Lytle, and G.P. Putnam’s Sons for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review! It has a gorgeous cover, but sadly wasn’t for me. However, I still recommend picking it up, because fans of the genre may like it more.

I really enjoyed the unique writing style of this book. It started out slow but I’m glad I stuck it out because it was an overall entertaining and enjoyable read.

Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Group Putnam for the ARC.