This is a lighthearted and entertaining book about life in an office, the characters we meet and the bonds we make. It is told from the point of view of the socially awkward, depressed, shy but not introverted co-worker Jolene. She hasn’t made any friends or connections at her job of eight years although she would like to. Some of her observations are very amusing and satirical. Her sarcastic sense of humors is what gets her in trouble in the beginning of the book. Forced to take sensitivity training classes with the new HR guy, they quickly form a bond and he begins to bring her out of her shell. A computer snag helps her realize the co-workers around her are either worse than she imagined or better. Maybe she just hasn’t given them the proper chance. Jolene also deals with past traumas which impact her ability to get out of the rut she has created for herself.
Lots of comedic moments in this book, a lovely romance, and heart warming human interest stories made this a really good read for me. I know it is early in the year but so far this is my favorite read. I hope we will see many more books from Natalie Sue in the future.

Thank you Willima Morrow and Netgalley for allowing me early access to this book.

#IHopeThisFindsYouWell #NetGalley.

This was such a fun read - I was immediately sucked in continually compelled to keep reading. The writing was smart and vivid - the reader could have a perfect picture in their mind of what was going on and how the characters were feeling. I was hopeful, frustrated, anxious, thrilled, and devastated along with Jolene.

3.5 stars

This was a highly anticipated book for me for no other reasons than I loved the title, cover, and the hope for a funny workplace drama.
Though it did have its humorous moments, it was far more relatable and genuine than I expected. The characters and situations felt real, and the humor was just right and not too over the top.
I really enjoyed this.

Every once in a while you find a book where the main character just feels like it could be you. Sometimes, that's really not a good thing.

Jolene is awkward, depressed, prone to saying the wrong thing, and a complete homebody who constantly feels like she's disappointed her mother. After being discovered writing a snarky addendum to an email and forced into an HR course, she discovers she has access to the office's emails and correspondence and makes an absolutely insane plan to become a perfect employee and dodge the upcoming layoffs.

This book basically follows Jolene as she gets better with other people, and worse with herself. I cried a lot, but found a lot of relatable hope as well.

I got an eARC from Netgalley (thanks!), but Jolene's scheming and avoidance of her problems resonated with me and you can bet I'll be getting a hard copy when it's available.

First I would like to thank HarperCollins and Netgalley for allowing me early access to this book.

I expected a light and predictable comedy about cubicle workers, but found a heartfelt, compassionate and smart story about very real characters.

This book is perfectly constructed and written, and felt so real.
I coul not put it down.

3.5/5 stars

Jolene knows her coworkers send messages back and forth to one another to talk about her. She feels alienated in the office, desperately trying to make herself as invisible as possible in order to keep her job. She hates her coworkers so much that she tells them how she really feels at the bottom of her emails; she uses white font so they’ll never see it, but she makes the mistake of using light pink and ends up in her bosses office.

Her emails are being screened, but when the new HR guy loads a software onto Jolene’s computer to track her email activity, he unknowingly has given her the power to see emails and conversations from the computers of her coworkers. Should she use this power for good or for evil?

I enjoyed the storyline, but Jolene’s constant worry about her job security was repetitive throughout the book. The humor mixed in with her secret past trauma was enough for me to finish the book, but I still feel as though Jolene’s character could have been less sulky even when her life starts getting better.

This book was soo good! I’ve never read a book that made me laugh as much as this one! I didn’t expect for the book to take a serious turn but it has a perfect flow and ending! I will definitely recommend this book to everyone. Definitely 5/5 stars for me!

I had the unusual experience of being both eager to read and anxious to avoid this debut novel. Natalie Sue creates the type of FMC who is usually right up my alley - introverted, socially anxious, hiding a troubled past - but her morally gray behavior made me so uncomfortable that I could only manage a few chapters at a time.

Jolene Smith is an office drone for a supermarket chain who passive-aggressively adds snarky postscripts to her emails in white font so her coworkers can't read how much she despises them. One day, hungover from her nightly drinking, she forgets to change the font color and is reported by her office nemesis. Jolene's punishment is to endure weekly anti-harassment sessions with Cliff, the nice new HR analyst, and to allow the installation of monitoring software on her computer. But the new software mistakenly gives her administrative status, allowing her to read the entire staff's emails and DMs. Tired of being the office pariah, Jolene vows to use her newfound power to avenge herself by sabotaging her coworkers while elevating her own work.

To her credit, Jolene does try to alert Cliff to the technical glitch, but he misinterprets her concerns, leaving her free rein to feed her worst impulses. Frankly, I had to question Cliff's sanity for being so quickly smitten by a woman basically comprised of 75% vitriol and 25% alcohol. At home, Jolene alternates between drinking heavily and trying to avoid the needy, friendless middle schooler who lives in her apartment building. I know, I know - "hurt people hurt people."

Jolene's situation is complicated by cultural issues; her overly involved Persian parents and community raise the stakes when her plan inevitably explodes. Her redemption arc humanizes her without completely smoothing over her rough edges. Honestly, the fact that I had such a hard time with Jolene's behavior demonstrates Natalie Sue's skill at creating realistically flawed but relatable characters (and that I spent way too much of my working life sucking up to authority figures).

ARC received by NetGalley in exchange for objective review.

I absolutely loved this one! Funny, emotional, and powerful. I already know it’ll be one of my faves from this year.

I was looking for a funny and heartfelt read and found that and more in I Hope This Finds You Well! In this workplace dramedy, Jolene is an introverted office worker with baggage: she has never healed from a years-ago trauma, so she tries to remain invisible at work while dealing with a roster of weird and sometimes cut-throat co-workers (though the aforementioned trauma is only hinted at in the beginning of the story—making it feel too minor, I believe—it does play a bigger role later); her disappointed Persian mother is trying to set her up with every decent-looking waiter; and a neglected neighbor girl has latched on to her for attention and conversation.

After a tiff with disliked co-worker Caitlin in which Jolene forgets to use an invisible white font when she adds her true thoughts to the end of an email (her coping mechanism), Jolene’s computer activity is to be tracked for aggressive keywords while she completes special anti-harassment training with the new Head of HR, Cliff. Instead of her computer being monitored, though, a mistake suddenly allows her to see the communications of everyone in her workplace. Seizing on this newfound leg up as rumors of job cuts loom, Jolene learns more about her office mates (one is getting basically zero work done every day) and boss (NSFW emails about bedroom habits), and that she is the target of not only office gossip, but an undercover Jolene-should-be-fired movement by Caitlin. As she uses this info in hilarious ways for good and bad—to set herself up for a promotion, seek revenge, pacify her mother, and even help others she has gotten to know better—she also connects with Cliff during her training and car-pooling (hilarious dialogue makes this a highlight of the book). And while part of the ending is visible from midway (the character has to grow, right?), the way author Natalie Sue gets there is not only fun, but sweet, tear-inducing, and soothing in turns.

I received an ARC of this title through the publisher and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

If you are a fan of the office, this book is for you! I was sold when I saw this book due to myself working in an office I knew I would appreciate this find!

Overall this is a fun, witty, and engaging read!! Thank you NetGalley for the ARC.

I will definitely be encouraging my coworkers to read this one.

Are you a rubbernecker? Like watching train wrecks? Then this story is for you. The story follows Jolene, an employee in a corporate setting who hides passive-aggressive/fully aggressive notes whited out in emails until she flubs up and gets caught. Also dealing with untreated trauma, Jolene is on a path to self-destruction. A faulty email tracking system installed as punishment accidentally lets her see everyone’s emails and IMs. After initially trying to come clean, she decides to use to her advantage. Reading this part funny part sad train-wreck, I was enthralled with how it would come crashing down. This held my interest til the end. I appreciate the author keeping Jolene messy and human.

Thank you William Morrow Publishing for providing this book for review consideration via NetGalley. All opinions are my own.

Wow. Ok. So this book was incredibly powerful. I started the book actually hating all of the characters- which isn’t a problem, I love books with unlikeable characters- but as the story unfolded, my heart broke for almost every single one of them. It holds a wonderful message that even your pettiest, meanest, cruelest enemy can be simply a human being in pain. Underneath all of the juiciness and corporate workplace tea that made this story so engaging and compulsively page-turning was a story about humanity and finding empathy for even the people who hurt us most. I’ll be thinking about this book for a while.

So witty and heartwarming -- and those two qualities don't always go together well! Here, they do, in the story of a woman who just does not seem to fit in to the corporate world. This book draws you in immediately, with a main character who is prickly and troubled, yet still very appealing. Great for fans of the TV show, The Office.

Jolene Smith is not easy to like. She is 33 and terribly lonely and isolated after a traumatic event in high school. At her job, where she's been for 8 years, she sits alone and doesn't interact with her co-workers. After work, she takes several buses to return to her dingy, messy apartment and drinks until it's time to go to work again. She rebels the only way she knows how: every time she sends an email at work, she adds in some nasty comments about the person she's sending it to, using a white font so the recipient won't be able to see it. She'll still feel the satisfaction of having sent it, though. This works until one day she forgets to use the white font when she purges her feelings. Next thing she knows, she's being called into her boss's office and threatened with being fired unless she undergoes harassment training from the new HR employee, Cliff. Once she's faced with the possibility of losing her job (even though she hates it and her co-workers), Jolene agrees to attend the training and mend her ways. Part of the new oversight involves monitoring software being installed on her computer. Once that has been done, she is startled to see that suddenly she has full access to all computers in the company. She can read emails, folders, files, phone logs, and even instant messages. She tries to alert Cliff to this, but he thinks she's upset at being monitored. Since Jolene feels her job is on the line, she decides it might be worth her while to monitor what people are saying about her.

In addition to having her suspicions confirmed that some people are working against her, she also becomes aware of the problems that other people are struggling with. She begins to not only open up to her co=workers in an attempt to appear more friendly, but she also starts to notice ways things could be done more efficiently in the office. Who knew spying could be so helpful?

Meanwhile, Joelene's Persian mother is determined to see her daughter make a good marriage match. That's why she's thrilled when it seems Jolene might have finally met someone. At the same time, Jolene feels herself drawn to Cliff as their anti-harassment training turns into carpooling and friendship.

I really enjoyed Jolene's snarky sense of humor when she allowed her guard down. At first, it was hard to like her as she constantly brushed off attempts at friendship or even cordiality. Still, her struggles to get her life in order while monitoring her entire office were quite amusing and touching. And I can totally get on board with her obsession with pastries!

I have realized I do not like office dramas. This felt flat to me, and I didn’t enjoy the main character. However I do think someone who has more experience in the corporate world might find this entertaining

In this story we follow Jolene who has some underlying issues with trauma and alcoholism that she so desperately needs to address. But albeit, that is just some of the facets of Jolene.

Jolene is kind, self loathing, a mom-pleaser, and pessimistically optimistic. She works an office job for a big corporate type, and there she has several office space type workers that fit your typical cliches- the good two shoes, the senile worker, the dead beat boss, your quiet male worker with no spine, and the overly nice HR rep guy.

Jolene who suffers some mild bouts of anxiety and her self loathing, she finds that sneaking secret messages in white ink to her coworkers normal emails gives her just the bit of something to merch in to a job she doesn’t particularly like. But she messes up once, and forget to ink her secret hidden text about her coworkers lunch room choices, and gets in trouble. There she is partnered with the companies new HR geeky nerd rep who will facilitate her probating training. At the start of this probation though, they need to install some software on her work laptop to monitor (I would have quit right then) and instead of doing that they irrevocably give her admin server permissions to see alll slack and email correspondence in her jobs company.

Insert here the hilarity that ensues with coworkers talking about you behind your back, the rumor of lay offs, and the plan to not only keep your job but also get promoted.

This book was written very well, and I found it remarkable from a corporate anxiety girly stand point. I laughed and chuckled, and this book actually gave me my first tear.

Giving it four stars because I found the ending to be a little unrealistic in my opinion. I would have loved to see a bit more audacity and good for her vibes! But overall I think this book was tailored more as a rom com with office space vibes.

Very cute, will definitely recommend.

Four stars, rounded up from three and a half

Maybe halfway through this book, I realized I hadn't checked my page count in quite some time. I *compulsively* check how much I have left to read. The highest compliment I can pay a book is when I lose myself in it; it happens rarely, even with the best stories.

Did this book break the mold? No. But it was funny and warm and relatable and just what I needed with *points to everything going on in the world*.

Note: If you work or have worked in an office, it could be a little triggering. Luckily my coworkers aren't this catty, and most of these characters find redemption. We are more than who we are in our private Teams chats.

I admit it was difficult to spend all my reading time about an uninteresting, uninspiring, petty, unfunny group of people, people that main character, Jolene, works with in her office for 40 hours each week. Until the new Human Resources manager, Cliff, arrives, her life was not only boring, but pathetic. How and why she stayed in that particular job with those people was not very clear.

Told in the first person, the novel has Jolene finally opening up and finding worthwhile things about some of her office mates, however, that made them more human as the novel went on. Nevertheless, it was not easy to keep reading about this uninspiring group of office co workers. Realistict people and realistic workplace, you might say.

That Jolene found her "true" self in the end helped, especially after working through her guilt about a past incident in her life that may explain why she remained so long in her current job. I was glad Cliff came to her rescue.

As I am the publicist for this book I am unable to provide an unbiased review. I Hope This Finds You Well by Natalie Sue comes out May 2024.