I really enjoyed this book. It was fast paced and an easy read that I couldn't put down. I totally got sucked into the story line and began rooting for the main character, Sunshine. I will definitely recommend this book to others.


Special thanks to NetGalley for allowing me to review this book.

Fantastic book. I have really enjoyed Laura Dave's work in the past and this was no exception. Very quick read--I couldn't put it down and was done in a day. Definitely worth one's time.

3.5 stars

This novel is narrated by Sunshine, a social media celebrity chef with a seemingly perfect life. We quickly learn that all is not as it appears, and follow Sunshine on her journey back to happiness.

Overall, I liked reading this and looked forward to picking it up. The themes of celebrity and self in the social media era were thought-provoking. The writing moves at a comfortable pace.

There were some things I didn't like about the novel: the characters often felt underdeveloped, and with some of them I wasn't sure why they were there at all (Violet, Ethan). I don't think the conclusion was very natural - it came suddenly, in contrast to the dragged-out commencement.

My main problem was with Sunshine herself. She did not seem to accept much responsibility for the choices she'd made, instead ascribing them to influential men in her life, or social media image. Actually, she did have options throughout her brief career and she didn't seem very contrite or self-aware.

I'd recommend this book for a quick read, but it's not one that will stay with me.

I received an uncorrected proof copy from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

A special thank you to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Sunshine Mackenzie seems to have it all and is truly living the perfect life. She has a successful YouTube cooking show, a series of cookbooks that would rival any lifestyle celebrity's, a devoted husband, and millions of followers. With a name like Sunshine, she radiates kindness; in actual fact, she is hiding who she really is. After a few tweets, Sunshine experiences a catastrophic fall from grace. She is left to pick up the pieces and reconnect with who she really is.

I really liked this foray into the effects of social media on one's life, and the pitfalls it can have on your social standing. Without giving a preachy commentary about how toxic social media can be, a lighthearted chick-lit novel is just the remedy one needs to remind themselves that everyone's life is not as picture-perfect as Instagram and Pinterest would lead one to believe.

My only criticism is with the actual characters themselves. Although Dave pens them as complex, there aren't any redeeming qualities, and the likability factor just wasn't there for me. For a novel that was about the superficiality of social media, I expected more.

The pace was on point, I was drawn in with her effortless writing style but was left unsatisfied by the ending. That being said, I would definitely pick up another book by Laura Dave.

Hello, Sunshine was such a great book that made you think about how much you would give up for fame. Based around Sunshine, a YouTube sensation who is getting ready to start her own cooking show on the Food Network when someone topples her world by hacking her twitter. As she navigates a divorce, cancelled show, and friends who turn on her she finds her authentic self. author Laura Dave wrote a great book that I could hardly put down! A great addition to your summer reading list! Thank you NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for the pre-release copy.

HELLO, SUNSHINE is a novel about social media, the lies we tell ourselves and the world and how to find our way back to truth. It was a well-written, entertaining read with an unconventional ending. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

I've been a fan of Laura Dave since her first book (which is still my favorite), so was very excited to get an early copy of this book from Netgalley. Really enjoyable light women's fiction but with a lot of heart, and her trademark knack for really bringing the characters to life. In this one, the main character, a woman who is becoming famous as a Youtube cooking show host suddenly has her life collapse around her, and goes back home to Montauk. She is certainly a flawed character who had a hand in her own downfall, but is nonetheless very sympathetic. I do wish the end wasn't left so open, but only because I really want to know more of what happens to the characters.

Hello, Sunshine is quite the book! It's a cute story with great characters (I really connected with them on a personal level) but I didn't care for the ending. Sigh. Sometimes this happens and readers won't agree with it (as shown here) but I tend to believe that not all endings are perfect in real life so why be so in books?

With that, I really enjoyed this book as a whole. Laura Dave is a new author to me, and after reading this one I think I need to go back and see what else she has written in the past!

Thank you NetGalley for my ARC of Hello, Sunshine - in exchange for an honest review.

I absolutely loved 800 Grapes by Laura Dave (which was the first of her books I had read), so I was excited to hear about her newest novel - Hello, Sunshine.

Hello, Sunshine tells the story of an Internet sensation, Sunshine who to the outside world is a chef. The story starts by her losing everything important to her, and her quest to find out who wronged her. While the story line is good, and I can see it being made into a made for TV movie... I would have loved to have seen more development of some of the relationships (Ethan and Sunshine, for one).

The story had an unexpected twist in there, that I really didn't see coming, which I enjoyed.

All in all, an easy weekend read, any of my friends who are chick-lit, Women's Fiction readers would enjoy this light story.

Thank you Netgalley for the chance to review this book. I really liked Laura Dave's Eight Hundred Grapes so I was really excited for the chance to read this book. The book centers around Sunshine who was internet cooking star who falls from grace when it comes out that she couldn't even cook! It definitely shows how social media can easily make you believe someone has a wonderful life and create an imagine that isn't really true. In one night she gets exposed and loses not only the empire she is trying to build but also her husband. Sunshine returns to her home town that she left at 18 to figure out what to do next. Back to the Hamptons, she learns to find her true self while developing a relationship with her adorable, smart niece. I wish there more of a development with some of the characters in her hometown like the fisherman she meets and love to have more scenes with her niece and sister. Her relationship with her husband was not developed as well.

However like Eight Hundred Grapes, the book was easy to read and flowed well. I could see it being a good girls night movie!

This was fine. This was solid. This was enjoyable. This wasn't addictive.

I felt like this was just so close to me loving it, but I never really became completely drawn in. Why? I'm not sure. This had solid writing, an interesting plot, and some well-drawn characters. But meh.

First of all, "spoiler" alert, the big fall from grace is simply that she didn't write her own recipes and isn't from where she said she's from. If she had been a bestselling author, I might have felt differently, but I found it hard to take the big deal seriously because they're recipes, and especially with the internet, recipes are so widely spread that anyone could have created them.

Our main character is immediately introduced as unlikeable and not entirely honest and I loved that about her until she proved to be quiet mediocre and kind of likeable but definitely not unlikeable. I think I got too excited about having a villainous main character that to then have her be jovial was not terribly fun. The book doesn't take her through any big changes personality-wise and she doesn't really grow or change.

Her new job and her family was probably the redeeming aspect of this book--she has an adorable niece and her sister has some interesting friends. The interactions amongst them were fun to watch, though their history was strange. I loved reading about her new job within the restaurant industry and her strange boss. I wanted to see more of that.

You'll probably enjoy reading this. I did. But it's not one I'll write home about.

Another thoroughly entertaining novel from Laura Dave. Very contemporary and full of surprises, although I wished some plot lines were wrapped up or altogether removed. Read in one sitting on a beach vacation and I'm sure other readers will delight in doing the same when the novel is released this summer.

I absolutely loved this book. It starts out with a bit of a Gone Girl feel-unlikable and untrustworthy main characters, a bit of suspense. And, there a certainly a few twists and turns throughout this book that will keep you on the edge of your seat. However, this book contains a surprising amount of personal growth and heart within its characters. I know that other reviewers were not thrilled with the ending. However, I didn't share their disappointment. I thought the ending was right in line with the decisions that I believe the characters would have made. Hello, Sunshine is a great read.

I received this book free from NetGalley in exchange for my honest and unbiased opinion.

“When how you appear to the world is aligned with who you believe you are, you will understand what it means to be free.” Mel Robbins

The protagonists of Hello Sunshine aren’t the typical characters easy to root for. Even though the main characters are far from perfect, flaws abound in this drama, still they have a thought-provoking story to tell, and Laura Dave, author of bestseller Eight Hundred Grapes, makes it engaging with her compelling writing style.

Sunshine Mackenzie, the main character, presents herself as living the perfect life, and falling from grace afterward. The core of the story manages the idea of a “curated life” as the main issue here, but I don’t think that’s the cause of Sunshine Mackenzie’s problems. Her life is not so much “scrupulously assembled” and more of “unscrupulously assembled.”

This is a thought-provoking story, light on the angst, and a compelling writing style.

A perfect summer read.

Hello Sunshine will be adapted into a major motion picture. Laura Dave will adapt it with her husband, Oscar-winning Spotlight co-writer Josh Singer. Producers: Amy Pascal, and Rachel O’Connor.

ARC provided by the author via NetGalley.

I enjoyed reading this book. The storytelling is certainly engrossing and the plot itself is engaging. Dave tells the story of a YouTube phenomenon who gets lost in the world of lies and living the false image she's created for herself. When it all comes tumbling down, she's forced to find a way back.

I like the refreshing way this story is told, even with a not particularly likeable protagonist. I couldn't put this book down and I could feel the all the emotions running wild in this story. I'm excited for more people to read it when it comes out!

Laura Dave is quickly becoming one of my favorite authors! Thanks to Netgalley for an ARC of her latest Hello Sunshine.. Sunshine Mackenzie is an Internet phenomenon. A YouTube star of a cooking show and cookbooks, her presence completely built in the online world . She lives Instagram and Twitter. In one fell swipe her life implodes when information is put on Twitter about the true Sunshine Mackenzie. She looses her job, husband and a place to live seemingly in an instant. The story follows Sunshine as she tries to recoup some kind of life and uncover who was the culprit behind the tweets that unseated her life. It is a rocky journey and speaks volumes about lives that are only an online picture of perfection, that are not based in any kind of reality, afraid to let people know who and what is really there . A social commentary told in a very beguiling way, my biggest problem with the book is that I feel it ended a little short. But I always feel that way about characters that I'm not ready to let go of!

Hello, Sunshine
Laura Dave
Available: July 11, 2017
Thank you to NetGalley.com and the Publisher for providing me with an advanced-reader copy of this book in exchange for my honest opinion.
I have a soft spot for Laura Dave and her books. After all, she was the first author I reviewed on FSM when I read “800 Grapes” last year. Naturally, I was super excited to read her latest offering.
What I loved: Sammy is the best and since children always upstage the main character – she is my absolute favorite. The family unit of Rain, Thomas and Sammy is honest, and realistic to how lives really are today – parents working hard to provide for their kids, people trying to do what’s best.
What I didn’t love: Sunny just isn’t my favorite character. Without giving too much of the story away, she’s just too fake; too caught up in how she’s viewed by all and not by the few that should matter. Yes, she gets her head right in the end, but it ends awkwardly and with a lot of confusion.
What I learned: No one has that perfect life – stop faking it.

Overall Grade: B-

I was given the chance to read this early from Netgalley.

I found this to be a unique story and the characters to be believably dimensional.
Sunshine hosts a cooking show and is just about to hit the big time. Then the unthinkable happens, she is hacked and her secrets are leaked.
You feel badly for Sunshine first. Then you learn her secrets and like her less.
That is a factor I appreciated in this story. Sunshine wasn't just someone who had been wronged, she wasn't 100% innocent herself or totally lovable, but she didn't deserve what happened to her.

This made her feel more real and it makes the reader route for her to save herself. We tend to build celebrities up, obsess over their downfall and then route for them to get a fresh start.

Sunshine has to take responsibility for her bad choices and it is up to her to fix everything.

The portion of the book spent in her hometown was a bit slower but still enjoyable.
Also, there are plot lines left to interpretation rather than set in stone.

There could easily be a sequel to this book, in my opinion.

Thanks for the early read. This will definitely be a hit for summer reading.

Sunshine Mackenzie isn't Sunshine McKenzie, but who is she? The reader joins Sunshine on her journey to find out who she is, and it is a totally engaging one!

Sunny's life implodes when her popular cooking website is hacked, her careeer and marriage are destroyed. Everyone she loves and trusts abandons her, she is thrown into temporary poverty. So, where does someone who has nothing go? Home. Sadly, there's not much left there either, a family house that has been sold, a sister who greets her with total hostility and a niece she doesn't know.

There, Sunny begins the rebuilding of her life despite the odds. The situation is made more complicated by the discovery of her unexpected pregnancy. Yet, Laura Dave keeps the story from becoming mawkish or simplistic. This is simply a wonderful read. It also gives pause to the reader about the unexpected uses of social media and the "new" meaning of privacy.

I loved the book and look forward to having folks around me who have read it so we can enjoy the thoughtful discussion it will provoke. This is certainly a great read for our time!

Definitely a page turner and will have you in the first chapter. It incorporates the cooking show frenzy with the social media empire that we have all come to know and are often driven by.

Online cooking celebrity has it all, or she does, until the social media sites that created her are hacked. Would the real Sunshine please stand now! Sunshine realizes all along that the life she is living is built on a deceptive social media portrayal, but no one knows. And, they are just little deceptions that her husband has approved, except one.

Who "exposed" her? Why? Will she exact revenge? These questions mixed with a little family drama and a touch of romance keep you turning pages to find out more.

Thank you, NetGalley and Simon & Schuster, for the ARC of this book in return for an honest review.