DNF at 25%. I found the voice to be very two-dimensional and the storyline to lack plot. I was hoping for more heart or humor, even found family dynamics at the very least. I’m sure as a teacher there may be many relatable moments, however I found it to be inhospitable to those of us not in the academic world. Thank you to NetGalley for the advanced copy, this one just wasn’t for me!

This was such a fun, heartwarming read, and for sure a must for anyone in education. But you don’t have to be a teacher to enjoy this book. From the principal to the school nurse and custodian, each chapter focuses on a member of the Baldwin High School faculty and/or staff.

I don't know what I was expecting, but this was not it. Unfortunately, I had to DNF at 50% because I had no desire to keep reading. This is likely a case of me and not the book. I just failed to connect with the storyline or the characters. I did however recommend this to my parents because they are teachers, and I think a lot of this would resonate with them.

Thank you to NetGalley and Dutton for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

What a delightful tribute to public school faculty and staff! If you’ve ever worked in a school, you’re sure to see some similarities between your experiences and the stories in this novel. I enjoyed the structure with different chapters focusing on different staff members, as well as the balance between funny and more serious moments. This book was a good reminder of how blessed we are as a society to have people who are called to serve as educators.

THE FACULTY LOUNGE by Jennifer Mathieu is a LibraryReads selection for July. Mathieu writes movingly about a complicated work setting (schools are notorious) with many undercurrents. It's clear from her relatable prose about parents and administrators that Mathieu has decades of experience as a teacher. Booklist says "this sentimental and funny book will appeal to readers of character-driven narratives." Enjoy!

This novel was so well written and such a beautiful story. Having a close relationship with several people who work in education, I feel like I deeply resonated with this story. The insight on the characters and the themes/messages throughout this novel will stick with me for a long time. I highly recommend this book to anyone who works in a school and will definitely pass this on to those in my life who work in education.

Sometimes you just need a deeply relatable and incredibly validating book. As a speech therapist, the American education system is something I find myself self doom spiraling over frequently and this book felt like it was saying “I get it. It’s ridiculous.”

“You really had to hand it to Mr. Lehrer. While dying at work is never ideal, he had the decency to do it during his off period. And not only that, but at the start of it, too, giving the clerks in the main office plenty of time to find someone else to cover Ms. DeLaRosa’s Spanish II classes, even as they scrambled to figure out who should be telephoned when an eighty-two-year-old substitute teacher lies down on a ratty couch in a high school faculty lounge and dies. “

Jennifer Mathieu’s new novel, The Faculty Lounge, has been described as love letter to teachers. Though it is darkly funny in a number of places, the description isn’t wrong. By the ten percent mark, I had cackled out loud twice, it was so strangely accurate.

My thanks go to Penguin Group Dutton and NetGalley for the review copy. This book is for sale now.

Our school is Baldwin High, a Texas school with a solid reputation. After the stage is set, with poor Mr. Lehrer breathing his last breaths during his planning period, and another teacher being cranky when the paramedics make her leave before her photocopies are done so that they can work on him, the story is organized with a single chapter per character. Obviously there are a lot more people on Baldwin’s staff, but this method works quite nicely, and since the characters interact, the chapters that come later in the book are richer, because there’s more backstory to help us understand them.

The youngest teachers have grown up with the knowledge that they might be shot to death at school; first they grew aware of this when they were students, and now, as teachers, the danger is still there. While older staff members tend to be rattled by a lockdown, younger ones see it as almost routine. Take attendance, salute the flag, and whoops, there it is. Herd any students outside of your door into the room, then lock it. Everyone on the floor. Pull your window blinds. Wait till it’s over.

I appreciated every character in this book, and I was sorry when it ended.

There are crises at Baldwin, just as there always seem to be fires to put out in real schools; there are high maintenance parents with absurd complaints, as well as idiotic district directives. Bureaucrats! Toward the end, a veteran teacher explains to a newer one that some days, “the best you can do is show up and hang on.” So true! Your reviewer is retired from the profession, and I can recall a wise older teacher saying to me privately during difficult periods, “I’m here. And I’m dressed.”

The whole thing seems so familiar.

How much will this resonate to readers that aren’t educators? I have no idea, but I know that the in-jokes, the sense of the familiar, can’t be as strong. For a general readership, I’d say this is a four star read. Possibly this is true as well for those that have always taught early childhood, because many of the parameters are different. But for those of us that have taught middle and high school, particularly for those that are veterans, this is a solid five star read.

Cheerfully recommended to all, and highly recommended to veteran secondary teachers.

This was such a lovely read. I typically don’t love fictional books without a big hook but this was a delight. I loved the short story format focusing on various staff and their nuanced background and various angles. I so recommend this as a palette cleanser or if you’re in a book rut.

Thanks to NetGalley for the advance copy!

As once a high school math teacher and then a university professor, I thoroughly enjoyed reading this poignant book. It presents us several stories about teachers, beginning, surviving, and then ending their careers in the classrooms and school itself: principal, assistant principal, teachers, supply teachers, nurse, guidance teacher, and school cleaner. All have a similar theme, that of caring for their fellow colleagues, their students, and wanting to do the right thing, even if that means not following the rules all the time. I was brought to tears several times during the book at the injustices, on the one hand, and the kindness on the other hand of teachers. These faculty work in a building for most of their careers and build strong bonds both with the facility and the people themselves. They reveal how times change and accordingly, so must teachers. Well written, and deeply moving. An excellent book.

Obviously I had to read this as a teacher and it was SPOT ON. I truly could see some of these things happening at my school (if they haven’t already) and I felt like I could match characters in the novel to my actual coworkers. I loved the real world hot topics (shown through emails between and parent and teacher.) Mathieu has such an easy writing style that will make this enjoyable for all readers!

I requested this book on a whim and boy am I glad I did! This warmed my heart, made me laugh and kept me invested from page one. The characters are going to stick with me for a long time.

Baldwin High School stands tall in Texas, decades of students and teachers passing through its doors. It holds dreams and aspirations, mistakes and apologies, pasts and futures.

There is Mr. Lehrer who started at Baldwin as a young teacher right out of college. He didn’t know much at first, but he grew with the job. He taught with strength and compassion. He was loved. When the time came, he retired. But he became tired of watching reruns on television and came back to substitute, where he found he was still loved. Teaching was never a job for him. It was his vocation, and when he passed on the sofa in the third-floor faculty lounge during his free period, he left the staff and faculty at Baldwin changed.

Principal Kendricks wasn’t supposed to be there. He was going to be in a punk rock band. That was how he met his wife. His band had been playing at a bar, and she came up to him afterwards. She liked their songs, the ones he sang, the ones he wrote. He fell in love, got married, had a kid. He had to get the kind of job a responsible adult would get, and he’s worked his way up to principal of Baldwin. It’s a job that gets harder all the time, with Central Office making more rules, making it all about test scores, making them do more with less funding.

And when he gets caught out front of the school by the PTO president as he was scattering the ashes of Mr. Lehrer, per the late teacher’s specific request, the eyes of the district are even more focused on Baldwin, and on Principal Kendricks himself. Will he even make it through the school year?

But the school year rolls on. First-year teacher Ms. Sanderson gets caught in the small English department book room with Mr. Rayfield during a lockdown, and after an hour or so of not knowing what’s going on, they find themselves up making out like the teenagers they teach. Mr. Williams accidentally responds to a parent’s email with the frustration he thought he was forwarding to a colleague, and he almost gets fired. A guidance counselor dealing with personal grief crosses over into alcoholism, and a long-time teacher notices and guides her to help.

There is the Christmas party where the teachers all bring their tackiest holiday gift from a student or parent, and there is a system for who gets which gift, with the chance to steal a gift you like from someone else. There is the custodian who is an illegal immigrant, working hard because her sister had gotten her to the States with the promise of an easier job. There is the nurse who has seen it all, from the freshmen trying to get out of a test to the girls who end up in her clinic crying because of a missed period.

As the school year comes full circle, to graduation and then summer break, the teachers and faculty at Baldwin are reminded of why they do what they do. Teaching isn’t just a job. It’s a calling, a vocation. They make a difference every day they show up for work.

The Faculty Lounge is the first adult novel by acclaimed YA author Jennifer Mathieu. This character study of the teachers and staff at a good but underfunded high school is a reminder of how important teachers are, of how inspiring but fallible they can be, of how hard it is to teach and how rewarding when you reach the right student at the right time. These interconnected stories weave together a full picture of what it takes to keep a school together, even in times like these.

I really enjoyed The Faculty Lounge. It’s clear from these stories that Mathieu has spent some time in schools as a teacher, with these stories being a testament to all she has seen and to the good work she and her colleagues have done through the years. Filled with humor, frustration, and compassion, these stores speak to the heart of education, to how much these teachers want to do their best by these kids despite all the holes in our current education system. I was expecting more of a novel, where this book is more a series of interconnected stories, so I did struggle a little in the middle when it started to feel disjointed, but I thought the writing itself was lovely and the characters compelling, so I don’t really have anything else negative to say about the book. I did find some things resonate with my experiences with school, and it brought me some lovely memories to think about, because teachers really are heroes and I don’t think we say that enough (or pay them enough).

Egalleys for The Faculty Lounge were provided by Dutton through NetGalley, with many thanks.

The premise of the book was incredibly interesting to me and caught my attention. It is about a veteran teacher who had retired and come back to substitute at Baldwin High School, when he suddenly died on an old, dilapidated sofa in the faculty lounge.

I really appreciated the guide in the beginning of the book, listing the characters and their roles (assistant principal, counselor, English teacher, etc). The first paragraph sucked me in and was funny, even surrounding the situation. I resonated with Amanda because I have also always wanted to be a teacher, even when others don’t understand and even dissuaded me, and it was nice to feel represented in a book. Overall, I enjoyed reading a book about teachers, as I don’t typically read books like this.

However, the chapters are incredibly long, which made it hard to keep picking the book back up since I don’t like to stop in the middle of chapters and couldn’t always dedicate that much time at once. I don’t know if the writing wasn’t for me or I didn’t enjoy the third person POV, but I didn’t love the writing style. The timeline also jumped around quite a bit, without warning. For example, the ashes incident happened, then suddenly, two teachers are in a room stating it had been 2 weeks since the incident.

All in all, I enjoyed the story and would still recommend the book if long chapters and a third person POV don’t bother you.

A retired high school teacher (now working as a substitute in his former school) quietly dies in the faculty lounge, which sets off a chain of events that affects the entire staff of the school. This was written like a series of connected short stories about various faculty members and their interactions and it was a delight from start to finish. From teachers hooking up in the book room, to the ex-punk band member/now principal rebelling to protect his people, to drunken holiday parties, to parents freaking out about nonsense, this felt like it was written about real people in a real school. I absolutely loved this.

This was a beautiful jump into adult fiction by Jennifer Mathieu. This book left me pretty emotional and I was very drawn to each narrative, I really enjoy multiple narrators. Educators and staff within my high school really changed my life, so seeing such a human portrayal was really moving. The story flowed beautifully between each narrator and and I just really loved this. Will absolutely be revisiting.

Absolutely charming! This is an easy read if you want to lose yourself in a collection of stories that weave together around a school community and the people who work there. Jennifer Mathieu’s The Faculty Lounge is poignant and heartfelt with a nice dash of humor throughout. I found myself caring about the characters even though each only had one chapter to tell their story.

The book centers around Baldwin High School in Texas and the faculty and staff who work there. The catalyst that brings this particular collection of stories together comes when a beloved, retired teacher comes back to substitute teach and passes away taking a nap on the ratty couch in the faculty lounge (the author comically notes that the timing during the beginning of the free period was quite kind, giving the office an entire hour to find a substitute for his next class).

Mr Lehrer’s passing is both central to and a side plot after the first chapter. The body can’t be picked up for some time, and so it remains in the faculty lounge for hours covered with a sheet. The teachers discuss the wording of the email from the principal and how it could have been worded to be more accurate (these small moments made me laugh because it is such a teacher thing). The rest of the book weaves through stories of different members of the Baldwin High School faculty.

I liked that the stories were linked by the incident with Mr. Lehrer in the faculty lounge, but they were also about the person and part of their journey as a person who was also a teacher. There’s Mrs. Fletcher (Amanda) who is one of the few teachers present who worked with Mr. Lehrer at the school. She remembers his kindness when she was a new teacher, as well as an uncomfortable kiss in a parking lot after a staff event that he was unendingly embarrassed about after. She reflects on the change during her career with the #metoo movement, but doesn’t identify the incident with Mr. Lehrer as being anything like what is being talked about. If anything, it was a catalyst that eventually led her to break up with her long-term boyfriend. In a nice circle back, her chapter ends with her offering advice to another new teacher who is struggling, just as Mr. Lehrer did for her many years before.

Mr. Lehrer’s will specified that he wanted his ashes to be spread in the front courtyard of the school because teaching at Baldwin brought him so much joy (which is so sweet I could honestly cry). The principal isn’t sure what to do, but since there isn’t a policy forbidding it, he goes ahead and has a brief memorial with the teachers and begins to spread the ashes. Unfortunately, the head of the PTO Jessica Patterson comes upon this and a gust of Texas wind scattered the ashes right onto her. Yikes! This event incites further fallout, though as a personal note I find it outrageous that anyone wouldn’t honor this? Instant dislike for Jessica Patterson, who does not take this lightly (don’t worry, though; things always come back around on people like that).

Ms. Sanderson was the teacher who discovered Mr. Lehrer’s body. Two weeks after the incident with his ashes, the school is called into a lockdown and she finds herself in the book room with Mr. Rayfield. In one of the more uplifting chapters, the two young teachers connect in those hours locked down (including a PG make out!). I also loved their conversation (as the two youngest teachers) about growing up going through drills for active shooters regularly. This is a unique experience for younger teachers; older teachers didn’t have that worry at the forefront of society.

One humorous chapter is written almost exclusively in emails between English teacher Andrew Williams and a parent who objects to her child reading The Autobiography of Malcolm X because she recently learned about Critical Race Theory and thinks the book is racist against white people (yikes!). The emails themselves are comical, but I was shook when Mr. Williams accidentally replied to one of them when he meant to forward it to his friend and colleague, Lydia Brennan. I think we can all relate to forwarding a particularly outrageous email or text to a friend, so the horror that he accidentally forwarded it to the mother who wrote it with his commentary felt too real for comfort! Lydia Brennan’s story revolves humorously about a student housesitting for her and finding her vibrator. Ms. Brennan is feeling down when another relationship fails in infidelity when she receives a note from her student saying how special she is as a teacher.

Assistant Denise Baker has the unfortunate task of helping clear up the situation with Mr. Williams. Her words to him show kindness. When we move to her story, we learn about the passing of her wife and her depression in the wake of that. She is drinking too much, including at work. And a teacher on the receiving end of an inappropriate alcohol-infused evaluation reacts not with anger, but with compassion. He is sober as well, and offers to support her sobriety. This story was one of the more emotional ones, but I also felt the kindness in one colleague noticing the human suffering another was going through, and offering support.

Principal Mark Kendricks had a running story throughout, beginning with the discovery of Mr. Lehrer’s body and the spreading of his ashes into the courtyard (and onto the PTO president). I loved his character—a flawed man, but one who always tried to do what is right and often with a laugh of good humor. Mr. Kendricks’ story revolves around his attraction and connection to an assistant principal, Kitty Garcia. He has an opportunity to engage in an affair with her, but he doesn’t do it. Mr. Kendricks’ memories of meeting his wife Lisa and falling in love were sweet. Later, we learn that Mr. Kendricks has been removed as principal because of the incident with the ashes. The school community is devastated (don’t worry, this isn’t the end of Principal Kendricks’ story!).

School custodian Luz Guevara is an undocumented immigrant from El Salvador. Luz shares fond memories of Mr. Kendricks and Mr. Lehrer being kind to her, which was touching but sad. Luz was a math teacher back in El Salvador at an all-girls school, but no one besides Mr. Lehrer knew this. They see her as a custodian and someone that is largely invisible to them. Luz’s invisibility leads her to observe an inappropriate interaction between a teacher and a student, but her undocumented status makes it difficult to report. Mr. Lehrer reports it for her, keeping her name out of it. Later, Luz will be the person who sees Mr. Kendricks get escorted out of the school—an event that devastates the school faculty. Luz’s chapter was perhaps the most heartbreaking, but it also showed the moments of kindness that may seem insignificant, but can mean the world to someone else. Isn’t this a lesson we could all follow more often?

Nurse Honeycutt ends up playing a major role in the story. A student comes to her in tears after finding out she is pregnant. She is scared to tell her father, and she’s worried it’ll ruin her future. She’s about to graduate. Nurse Honeycutt reflects on a pregnancy she had at the age of fifteen, and her lack of options. She was sent away to hide the pregnancy and birth, her child was given away, and she came home to find her boyfriend and his family had moved away. Now, Nurse Honeycutt knows that the supreme court decision took away the right for many women to have options. She has options, and she leaves the pills with instructions on how to use them in the student’s locker. She doesn’t know what happened until the student’s mother comes to see her. She’s grateful to Nurse Honeycutt for helping her daughter when she had nowhere to turn. In a twist, we learn that the student is the daughter of Jessica Patterson, the head of the PTO who ultimately got Mr. Kendricks fired. Later when we find out that Jessica Patterson dropped the case and asked Mr. Kendricks to be reinstated, a small smile on Nurse Honeycutt’s face tells us everything we need to know. Hers was perhaps my favorite storyline!

As the book wraps up, Mr. Kendricks is reinstated, math teacher Lovie Jackson is retiring (this was a lovely mirror to Mr. Lehrer’s retirement story), and Mr. Lehrer’s son sends a heartfelt letter to the school about how important it was to his dad and how grateful he is that they honored his dad’s wishes (take that, Jessica Patterson and central office!). The final scene occurs in 1962, on Mr. Lehrer’s first day teaching at Baldwin High School. A more senior teacher reassures him, “No one is ever really ready for the first day.” Throughout, we have seen this same kindness and mentorship from more senior teachers passed on to younger teachers, beginning with Mr. Lehrer helping Ms. Fletcher in her first week. The cycle of these teachers going on to offer that support to someone else wove a thread of kindness through the book.

The story centers around a school and the events surrounding Mr. Lehrer’s death in the faculty lounge, but I think that the real core of the book centers around the moments of kindness one person shows another, and how that small act can have profound effect. A lovely and thought-provoking book.

This book was absolutely written for teachers. I was cackling at the depictions of public school!! They could not be more accurate with the caricatures of teachers and ridiculous things passed down from central office. Hilarious! This is also a sweet thread of the impact of the life of Mr. Lehrer who was dedicated to education. I will say that I loved the parts of the book that happened at the school, but I didn’t care for the more seemingly unrelated personal anecdotes. I couldn’t find the purpose of learning about one teachers breakup or the extended jaunt into the mind of one of her students. Overall, it was a quick enjoyable read and lost its way a little along the way

Well, this was a pleasant surprise. I expected to like this book. I didn't expect to love it.

It was such a lovely, sweet, sad, funny, all around touching tale about a year in the life of a group of high school teachers. Each chapter/story focuses on a different staff member and all of them were enjoyable.

I really liked the characters in this one and how timely this felt. It's the kind of book that I was sad to finish reading.

I read an ARC of this book from NetGalley. All comments are my own.

4.75/5 stars

This book was an original look at a unique subset of unsung heroes…teachers, specifically high school teachers/staff. I’m a huge proponent of these underappreciated and underpaid leaders in our society, and this look at their struggles/triumphs was very enlightening and thought-provoking.

The book is actually a collection of short stories that are interwoven and centered around the death of a retired (now working as a substitute) teacher. Each chapter takes a glimpse into the professional and/or private lives of a teacher/staff member at a high school in Texas. Funny, surprising, and at times heartbreaking, this was a joy to read, and I found myself viewing teachers from my own experience in some wholly different aspects.

Very well written, insightful and just a joy to read.

My sincere thanks to the author, NetGalley and PENGUIN GROUP/Dutton for providing the free early arc of The Faculty Lounge for review. The opinions are strictly my own.