So everyone kept calling this book "hilarious" and "laugh out loud" and I went in expecting pure comedy - the kind of book where you snort-laugh so hard your cats give you that look. And yeah, there ARE those moments. But what caught me off guard was how much this book actually aches.
Let me back up. I started this one on a Wednesday night, couldn't sleep, had just rage-scrolled through my ex-client's rebrand that looked suspiciously like my mood board concepts. So I was already in a petty, slightly wounded headspace - which, honestly? Perfect frequency for Ronnie's energy.
When Your Neighbor Steals Your Husband AND Your View
The setup is almost too cruel to be funny: Ronnie's husband Nick doesn't just leave her, he leaves her for Gaye, the next-door neighbor. And then - AND THEN - they won't move. They're just... right there. Every single day. The audacity alone had me pressing my phone against my chest like Abuela used to press her hand over her heart during the telenovela betrayals. She would have LIVED for this premise. The wronged wife, the shameless husband, the scheming family trying to help? That's a Tuesday night novela right there.
What makes it work is that Ronnie isn't some rom-com cartoon about revenge. She's genuinely devastated, and the comedy grows out of that desperation in ways that feel earned. Her family pushing her toward increasingly unhinged tactics to get Nick and Gaye to leave - it's funny because it's coming from love, and it's painful because you can tell Ronnie would rather just have her old life back. That tension between "burn it all down" and "please just come home" is where this book lives, and it's a more complicated emotional space than the cover suggests.
Suzie Tullett has a scriptwriting background (Masters in TV and Radio writing, apparently) and you can FEEL it. The dialogue has that snappy, scene-ready quality - conversations that clip along with timing that a lesser writer would fumble. It reads like it was written to be spoken aloud, which is a gift for audiobook format.
Deryn Edwards and the Art of Not Overselling the Joke
Okay, here's where I have to be honest - I went in with zero expectations for the narration because I'd never listened to Deryn Edwards before, and I couldn't find much chatter about her performance specifically. But what I can say is this: the comedy in this book requires restraint. If you oversell a funny line, it dies. If you push too hard on the emotional beats, it gets saccharine. Edwards keeps things grounded enough that when a moment lands - funny or sad - it feels like it's happening TO you, not being performed AT you.
That said, I didn't get the kind of distinct character separation that makes me lose myself completely. There were moments where I had to reorient - wait, who's talking? - especially during family scenes with multiple voices bouncing around. It's not bad narration by any means, but it's not Julia Whelan levels of "I forgot a human is reading this to me." It's competent and warm, and for a seven-hour comedy about heartbreak, that's... enough? But I wanted a little more texture.
The Crying Spreadsheet Entry You Didn't Expect
I did NOT expect to add this to the spreadsheet. But there's a moment - I won't spoil it - where Ronnie stops scheming and just sits with the reality that her marriage is over. Not the anger, not the revenge plots, just the quiet grief of it. And Edwards lets that silence breathe for just a beat longer than comfortable. Got me. Right in the throat. One entry for the spreadsheet, which for a book marketed as comedy is... significant.
The ending wraps up maybe a touch too neatly for my taste. Tullett's scriptwriting instincts give the book great pacing and dialogue but also that slightly-too-tidy resolution where everyone learns their lesson. Real life is messier. But at under eight hours, it doesn't overstay its welcome, and the ride there is genuinely fun. I had a similar complicated feeling about tidy resolutions when I reviewed Five Little Indians — a book that earns its messiness so completely that anything neater would have felt like a betrayal.
Who Needs This in Their Ears
If you love books where a woman has every right to be furious and the people around her are chaotically trying to help - yes. If you need a palate cleanser between heavy reads but still want something with a beating heart underneath the laughs - absolutely yes. If you're someone who grew up watching women on TV plot elaborate revenge against terrible men while your grandmother shouted advice at the screen - this book felt like coming home to that living room.
Skip it if you want deep romance or high heat. This is more about self-recovery than finding someone new. And if flat-out farce is your thing, the emotional undercurrent might feel like a speed bump.
This is a rainy Sunday book. Warm socks, second cup of coffee, cats on your lap judging you. Diego actually fell asleep on my keyboard during the last hour, which I'm choosing to interpret as a positive review.
