Let's just take a moment to appreciate how stunning the cover artwork is. I'm in love.

And now let's talk about how amazing the inside is too. I completely adored this book. It's hilarious and sweet, and our heroine, Bella, does a lot of growing up throughout the book while having some pretty wild adventures (of the bedroom variety).

Bella is searching for 'the one', but frankly, all that phone swiping is just giving her a cramp in her pointer finger. It seems like there are nothing but duds out there. Plus, instead of being the well-known author she thought she'd be by now, she's still working at the reception desk of a publishing house...watching other authors come and go all day. Oh, and if that wasn't enough, her best friend and roommate is moving out to live with her thoroughly not-good-enough boyfriend, and her rock-solid parents are getting a divorce.

Her friend Marty (who also happens to be her best friend's brother) gives her some advice to stop looking for love and start having some fun. Along those lines, Bella engages in a series of um...interesting?...encounters gives her an idea for a book. So she keeps going, starts writing, and things gets crazier and crazier. There are a lot of sexy-times but it's not really on-page or explicit.

It's more than a romance though. It's also about growing up, friendship, family, and being your own fairy godmother.

The audiobook was so well done. It was narrated by Josie Charles, who was new to me. I'll definitely be on the lookout for more from her though, I thought she brought the exact right amount of whimsy and seriousness, and really brought the characters to life. The audio comes in at 10 hours and 36 minutes.

I finished this book on 03/09/2023 and forgot to submit feedback!

Not That Kind Of Ever After was a magnificent story! I loved how the main character spiraled out of control on her mission to achieve her goal. Her love story along the way was also very special and kept me guessing.

The ending…it warmed my heart. Such a great reminder of what is important in life.

I could not put this audiobook down! The story and the narrator were both fantastic. It was all really well done. I’ve already recommended this book to friends.

Thank you NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for this advanced audio copy. I thoroughly enjoyed this story.

I knew this was going to be an adventure in hilarity and I was not disappointed. It definitely is. We get ups and downs surrounding career, friendships, family…basically life in general. It’s done in a way that shares the downs with a side of laughs and it feels like a real life walk down friendship lane with the main character.

Let’s write about our experiences with one night stands in search of our Prince Charming - and let’s write about them in the form of fairytales. This is absolute perfection on the comedy front. Going on these dates with her as well as watching her deal with the fallout of changes in her life is honestly amazing. She deals with everything in a human way. She isn’t constantly negative or unrealistically positive- she’s just human. And I appreciate that.

Overall ⭐️⭐️⭐️💫 - mostly because it was a bit longer than I felt was necessary.

Thanks to NetGalley for the audiobook!

This was a decent audio but I did have some issues.

The main character is very immature and codependent and obsessive with her best friend. Making assumptions about her best friends fiancé. A lot of miscommunication or lack of it leads to issues that could have been settled or left room for some other things.

There are a couple funny hook up parts but overall the idea of her sleeping through fairy tales and writing about them was a bit gross. Which then leads her need for validation from random people.
I think I did not like the main character at all for many reasons and it really made the story not great for me.

Although I received a copy of this audiobook in exchange for a review, all opionions remain my own.

Thank you NetGalley for the opportunity to listen to this audiobook!

First of all, this book is set in Britian, so you have a narrator with an accent which I loved. Then you have all those fun English words that are just a bit differently used in America, so be aware of that. In this story, Bella is looking for her prince charming, but all she seems to be finding in the streets of London are the frogs. So, she uses the frogs as inspiration for her writing. Lets just say that gets her noticed by a few people when she publishes her chapters online. Oh boy did this book have me laughing out loud. Between very hairy men and one who was painted blue, Bella really does find her way into the strangest situations. In the midst of the funny, her parents, whose love story she always looked at as an example, tell her they are divorcing, it basically turns her life on its head... the book really gets started. You will have to listen to this one to see the antics that Bella gets herself into. The ending was simple and beautiful though. Friendship is the best love of all.

I liked the premise of this book and I definitely enjoyed Marty as the MMC. I really didn’t like Bella though. She just seemed so hypocritical and unaware of her actions, and even though she owned up in the end, it took a long time to get there. And then she got the guy anyway

Not that Kind of Ever After is a quirky read about Bella a women who finds herself feeling stuck in place in her life, because of this she goes on a variety of ridiculous dates with a string of men from dating apps. While, I did find this book funny at certain times, I also, found myself frustrated with Bella and some her her decisions. In the end though there is some character development and the book was definitely entertaining.

Thank you to Macmillan audio and Netgalley for the audio copy in exchange for an honest review.

2.5/ 5 - 1/5 Spice

So firstly, I would like to say while this was not the book for me, I can understand why others would enjoy it. Its certainly leaning way heavier to Women's Fiction than a romance novel. My problems enjoying this book were primarily because Bella was such a hard protagonist to like. she was authentically chaotic and experiences a "transformation" by the end of the book, but it still was just so much chaos. How can a woman that aspires to be an author confidently claim she has no imagination, nd can only write based on her one-night stand experiences?

Brief Plot: Bella has always aspired to be an author. But in her dead-end secretary job, learning her best-friend is getting married to the worst guy, and her parents divorce, she goes through a new culture shock. How does she process this all? By writing her one-night stands into "Not Happily Ever After" Chapters, and posts them on B reader, an amateur story sharing website. Through spoofs of fairytale stories, she has stories, that slowly rise in popularity.

Thank you NetGalley and Macmillian Audio for an eARC Audiobook copy of Not That Kind of Ever After, written by Luci Adams, and narrated by Josie Charles. This is my honest review!

Ehhh. That’s how I felt. Just ehh. I wanted to like this but it took forever to get going. I found myself waiting for something good to happen. Bella is a 29 year old living in a flat with many other people. She has dreams of being an author and wanting to get married. But Bella kind of sucked. She seemed wayyyy younger than 29. She never took responsibility for herself. She just kept making the same mistakes over and over. Her finding love didn’t happen until the end and even so, was it actually finding love? I needed more romance. Idk it was okay.

Thanks to Netgalley, Macmillan Audio, and the publisher for this arc.

Macmillan Audio sent me an arc of "Not that kind of Ever After" in exchange of my honest opinion.

Not that kind of Ever After is about Bella, a 20 something girl that is looking for her prince charming. However, she does not like change and it seems everyone around her is changing but her. Her best friend is getting married with someone that Bella doesn't like, she moved out of her apartment, Bella's parents are getting divorced, and she is an aspiring author that is not seeing her work recognized, so in the meantime she works as a receptionist. One day, she decided to start publishing the story of her failed dates as if it was a book chapter in a beta reader website and goes viral.

I wish I had liked this book. the narrator was super good and she made Bella sounded like someone that I wanted to actually be friends with, however, Bella's character is just not likable AT ALL.
Firstly, she was jealous and went to self-pity monologues every 2 chapters. Look.. your BEST FRIEND is getting married and I get it, sometimes we don't like their significant other, but have a conversation. Just don't act as a entitled brat with her or him.. She also discovered that her parents were getting divorced and basically thrown a tantrum I would let it pass if this was a YA story but it was definitely not.
Additionally, the lengths she goes to have dates for her book just makes her so selfish! I was waiting to see when she would have a character development and change of pace, have some sort of light bulb situation of how rude and entitled she was behaving but by 88% of the book she doubled down, which made me want to DNF!

Also, this book doesn't know if it wants to be a romance or not. Bella goes to all these dates clearly not invested.. which is fine, you can want sexual freedom, however it was not her main personality trait that was established at the start of the book. She actually makes fun and ignores for 88% of the book the main romantic interest and you as a reader are not convinced of their feelings by the end of it.
Maybe this book could just have focused on her friendship with her best friend and it would be totally fine.

I listened to the audio version of this book narrated by Josie Charles. I think the narration really gives the listener a good vision of how light Bella's life is at times, but how off center she also appears to be.

The things I had issues with: This seemed like a really long book. I'm not necessarily saying that it dragged, but I would have appreciated there being more of the time after Bella finally figures out what she wants. I was also uncomfortable with how she could just meet someone at a bar and go home with them to have sex ten minutes later. I wouldn't want to promote that to anyone.

The good things: The concept of Bella writing about her promiscuous dates adapted to fairy tale style was really cute. The secondary characters of her friends and roommates were key to revealing Bella's real personality. Yes, she definitely was self centered and had some growing up to do, but you just don't have a best friend as close and as long as she's been friends with Annie without there being a good person in there. She had definitely improved in maturity by the end of the book and had become a more likeable and loveable character. I totally adored her "Prince Charming" in the end.

Thanks to Mcmillan Audio for the gifted copy. All thoughts are my own.

I wanted to enjoy Not that Kind of Ever After once hearing about the positive feminism take. Hoeevrr; I found this narrative dry and was unable to finish.

Poor Bella, she just wants a fairytale, but things just start to not go well. Her best friend is with a boring guy and moving out, her parents are getting a divorce, her new flatmates are odd, and she desperately wants to be a writer.

This book had some funny moments, the fairytale one night stands were creative and out there. What I struggled with was not really liking Bella's that much. She comes off whiny, intruding, and not much of a listener. I just wanted to scream at her for trying to force creating writing material. Thank goodness for Marty, he seemed down to earth and more real.

This book had some bright spots and was enoughto heep me reading, but I think I just wanted a more likable main character. The narrator was very entertaining and engaging, I think listening to her really helped me through this book. She emphasized the comedic parts very well.



Thank you to MacMillan Audio and Netgalley for providing me a copy of this Audiobook for my honest review.

Overall this was a cute, funny story. I liked the dates Bella went on as they made me laugh. She really got into some hilarious situations.

I liked the short chapters and I liked that Bella seemed to really grow as a person (she didn't start out as the nicest). I feel like the ending is sort of easy to guess but that didn't take away from the story because Bella still had some fun times throughout.

As a light romcom this was a good read.

I thought the narrator was great. I enjoyed listening to the story read by this narrator and the narration made me laugh lots of times.

Pubs tomorrow!

This was a fun take on a woman’s journey to find her happily ever after. I enjoyed the fact that Bella was an author who saw the world through rose-coloured glasses. Raised by parents who had their own meet-cute and fairy tale romance, Bella was destined to find her own.

After her roommate and lifelong best friend announced she is moving in with her boyfriend, Bella is devastated. She decides to write the book she has been trying to write for years with a slightly different spin. She’s going to write about her intimate encounters with one-night stands based on fairy tales. After all, she’s already hooked up with a hairy man she refers to as a wolf.

She posts a chapter at a time on a website for beta readers and a few men and chapters later her posts become extremely popular. But as time passes, she begins to learn more about herself and what she values most.

While this was an entertaining read, one of the critical elements for me is to like the protagonist. Generally speaking, I did. But there are many moments that I found Bella to be immature, irresponsible and even unfriendly. Happily, I began to see Bella evolve into a woman who becomes a little less self-centred in the latter parts of the book.

Josie Charles narrated the audiobook of Not That Kind of Ever After and gives an excellent performance. I enjoyed her youthful, expressive and articulate presentation. I encourage those readers who enjoy audiobooks to choose this format of this book.

I received a copy of the audiobook from the publisher but the thoughts and opinions expressed here are my own.

3.5 out of 5 stars

Bella was the conductor on the hot mess express called her life. She wanted the fairytale but not the happily ever after; she wanted happy for tonight. While she navigated her train wreck life, she was writing a story that were fairytale retellings with her own twist. There were instances that I felt Bella was self-centered and immature. But that also could be attributed to the changes in her relationships with her friend Ellie and her parents. What I did like was the fact that Bella was her own person and that she had realistic and relatable flaws. She knew she wasn't perfect and didn't strive to be. And while she was looking for her happy for tonight, her happily ever after was right in front of her.

Sarah Naughton did a stellar job of bringing Bella to life. Her tone of voice and inflections gave the characters personality and dimension. I loved her British accent which made me feel like I was in the room with Bella.

I received an advance copy of this book at my request from the publisher and voluntarily left this review.

3.5 Stars

I loves Adams boldness to write about sex with out all the super sexy detail. Sorry to disappoint if the super sexy detail is your thing. Super cute story line and the way she uses fairy tales. You will want to throttle the main character she is in her head A LOT.

Audiobook Narrator was a perfect choice for this character.

Big thanks to Net Galley, Luci Adams, and St.Martin Griffith for the opportunity to review this audiobook production.

Not That Kind of Ever After was an amusing listen. The concept of our main character writing fairytales based on her sexcapades was certainly unique. Bella is not usually a one night stand kind of gal, but she’s willing to try new things when she sees that her expectations have been set a bit too high.

There were a lot of funny moments and the author writes well but Bella was just downright annoying and selfish at times. Obviously, she’s meant to grow, but I often couldn’t even endear her to me because of the way she treated others. I also knew who she was going to end up with, which was fine, but it definitely seemed like there could have been more sexual energy cultivated between them especially given their personalities. It just seemed like the characters were expected to fall in love because of their history and not because of chemistry.

It was a fun novel but I have faith that the author will write more polished books in the future!

This was not really anything like what I was expecting….

I’m rating it 3-stars. I had a hard time deciding, but it could land between 3 and 3.5, depending on the part of the book. The first half was tough to get through, but the second half went a bit quicker, the main character, Bella, grew up a bit and started making more mature decisions that her 30 year old self should have been doing all along, and then it felt more worthy of a 3.5 rating.

The concept of this storyline was rather interesting in the blurb, but I found myself getting quite angry and annoyed at Bella pretty much the whole way through, with how she behaved like a teenager and how she treated everyone around her like total garbage. There is a character in here that Bella was upset with, and I have a friend of the same name that I found myself suddenly upset with in reality because the book made me feel immature feelings towards him (I took on Bella’s immaturity in those many pages) … sorry to my real life “friend” Mark who had the brunt of book hangover emotions! It’s not good to behave like a teenager because of a book getting you upset.

While we do see Bella finally grow up, realize what she’s doing, take on some responsibility for her actions, apologize for hurting people, stop being selfish and hurtful online, and even move on in her career, personal life and relationships, she still has a very long ways to go. I’m happy with how it all ended, though.

And finally, the audio to ebook, which I was reading both at the same time, differed greatly - the audio must have the original British version while the ebook was edited to be North American and audio a final edited draft. Big changes! I have read many British books and been there many times so understand the terms, but trying to read along with the audio and it’s so different made me lose my place a lot. The narrator, Josie Charles, did a great job! She’s a new to me voice, and while I wasn’t loving the material, she made it easier to get through.

I received an advance review and advance listen copy from NetGalley, St. Martin’s Press (St. Martin’s Griffin), and Macmillan Audio, and this is my honest opinion and feedback.

This was a cute, book-themed romance novel. The heroine goes through a wild journey to find her prince charming after dreaming of her fairy tale ending since childhood. When she decides to take a new stance on romance, she finds herself writing about her crazy romantic ventures.

This story was funny and entertaining. I enjoyed seeing this character change throughout this book. She had so much emotional and mental growth from the beginning of the book to the end. I am happy that she finally gets her happily ever after.