4.5 stars! i’m always wary of books about writers but this felt very raw and tender, not overindulgent.

chasing chaos in life cause it’s what’s comfortable with the coverup of avoiding chaos at all costs.

3 - Such mixed feelings about this one. I chose this novel because sometimes I am simply looking for a good story with fully developed characters that may not be an earth shattering work of literature but holds my interest and I care about the outcome. I should have known from the title that this may not be the book for me. First, I have aversion for characters who are writers. It often seems lazy and self indulgent. I also struggled with the unrealistic scenes with the protagonist Casey at both her jobs as a waitress and later as a teacher. I’ve had experience with both and they did not feel authentic (Q: What server gets repeated personal phone calls during their shift? A: None.) Also hard to take was the cliché, self-absorbed and insecure novelist Oscar that she dates. But, unlike other negative reviews I’ve seen of the book, I don’t think it’s poorly written. King can clearly write. It does flow and, although I didn’t love it, I read it quickly in a couple of days. An added bonus which is purely personal is that it’s set in Boston and Cambridge MA where I am from so always a bit fun to be familiar with the locations (including Walden Pond ♥️) throughout the story too. Now, back to some serious literature. ;-)

Wowww...I enjoyed this so much. There were a couple of puzzling things about it. The first thing was that there were some (not many) moments where I completely lost interest and tuned off the audiobook, only to rekindle my interest very shortly after. There may have been too many waitressing moments with many characters that made it confusing and I also wasn't really getting into the Luke story, but it was definitely worth carrying on. The second puzzling thing was that it wasn't very clear to me what this book was about: was it about writing, about grief, about health scares, about student debt, about choosing between lovers, about mental health, about traumatic childhood events?...It was about all of this, for sure, and that's why it's such a rich, complex layering of events, feelings, narrations. It's really such a treat, I don't know what else to say. I feel like reading it again.

The whole time I was reading this book I was imagining it as an indie movie directed by Greta Gerwig. This was a nice read! Its about a woman dealing with grief—but it was weirdly refreshing to not have her struggling, but not self-destructing in the ways we usually see in books and movies. I also loved the 90s setting and was totally taken back to my own waitressing days. The ending may seem too pat to some, but I found it really buoying—just what I needed!

This felt for some reason like an appropriate next book after Normal People. I really enjoyed it, I binge read it and i kept thinking she must be very attractive to have these men really smitten with her in that way and with her not really being anxious...i would like to talk to more people who read it.

Wow, so much depression. I couldn't get past the detailed first pages. I skipped ahead, and she was depressed seeing geese, pages passed but she was still on her bike riding to work.

Tossed aside.