Nina is a young woman who has carefully arranged her life in a way that plays to her strengths (including voracious reading and vast trivia knowledge) and accommodates her quirks (including anxiety and a strong need for structure and alone time). When circumstances suddenly upend her carefully planned life and intrude on her small social circle, Nina must decide the extent to which she wants to embrace or hide from these potential changes. Four stars. for this light, clever, and entertaining read, none the less enjoyable for its occasional lack of believability.

Charming and funny and sentimental in the best possible way, The Bookish Life of Nina Hill is a delightful read! Nina Hill may live in the sprawling city of Los Angeles, but she's managed to keep her life fairly small and curated. Between her job at the bookstore, weekly book club meetings, and her cutthroat trivia team, she stays busy and content. That is, until she finds out her long-lost father has died, and the perennially alone Nina has an entire family right there in LA. As she begins to meet her new family members, and through them, the father she never knew, Nina's world begins to expand in surprising ways.

This was a fun read, it reminded me of an episode of "New Girl" mixed with the movie "Amelie". The LA setting comes alive and there are some beautiful passages about books and reading that will set any bibliophile a-quiver. Nina, who any bookish introvert will relate to, had just the right amount of spunk mixed with crippling anxiety to make you want to like her and root for her. Things may get tied up a little too neatly at the end, but that's OK, it just adds to the fun, frivolous vibe of this book. Overall this was relaxing and engrossing weekend read! Also contains some memorable and laugh out loud quotes that I may use IRL...."grilled cheese in any form was her spirit animal" (yes...!!)

Loved it! Abbi Waxman gets better with each book! Nina is a romantic heroine for folks who don't like romance novels.

dnf at 15%, this book and the writing style just weren't for me. maybe I will try out another one of her books, but I just did not like this one.

Nina Hill was a delightful read. This is a funny, upbeat, slightly anxious and very clever novel.

Nina is a late 20s, book- and reading-obsessed woman who works in a very quirky bookstore. She had an extremely unconventional childhood, as the daughter of a single Australian globe-trotting photojournalist mother who hauled her around for a few years and then planted her in L.A. with a nanny. She was told that her mother was not certain about who her father was, which turns out not to be true.

Nina is smart as a whip, more than a little neurotic but not in an annoying way, and has her life set up exactly the way she wants. She lives by a daily planner and is organized to an extreme level. She gets anxiety attacks but not frequently and she has come up with coping mechanisms over the years.

Two major interruptions appear to upset her tightly orchestrated existence: a lawyer shows up to let her know that her birth father has died and she is a beneficiary under his will. She is not happy about suddenly acquiring a messy family and several siblings. And the other distraction is a man, a seemingly wonderful guy who forces her to confront her many fears and insecurities.

This book was very intelligent fun with an appealing cast of characters. Thanks to the publisher and to Net Galley for providing me with an ARC in return for my honest review.

Rating: 3.5 Stars
This was a smooth, enjoyable read. The author’s personality comes through very strongly, though I am not sure if this is intentional or unintentional. I found her wit to be charming for the most part, though I wish that the reader had received more insight into Nina’s thoughts. It was fun to see a lot of my own character traits in Nina: bookish, anxious, and obsessed with planners.

The plot felt very formulaic, and at one point a character made an off-handed joke about something that later actually happened. I wonder if this was meant to be a humorous jab at the formula.

In terms of the long lost family storyline, I was not too sold, but I was definitely sold on the characters, which is why this rating hovers between 3 and four stars for me.

I really enjoyed this book. It was fast moving, had quirky characters and caught your emotions as it related to what the primary character, Nina, was facing. In my opinion it was on the spectrum of "Chick Lit" so it was a nice chance to escape into the emotional world of an introverted, "Bookish" young lady whose world is shaken up. As a librarian, I can think of many patrons that I can happily recommend it to.

I enjoyed this book quite a bit as it was different from what I normally read. So many different aspects of this novel had me drawn to it, from the beautiful cover, to the highly relatable anxiety prone protagonist who loves a good plan, and above all a good book. Nina's carefully constructed world starts to shift in unexpected directions when she learns via the death of a father she never knew, that she has a whole extended family out there waiting to meet her. The book centers around Nina's interactions with her new family, her job at the bookstore and a new love interest. The engaging cast of characters really does make this character driven novel. I thoroughly enjoyed getting to know each one and reading about Nina's interactions with each one. No story about the love of books is complete with a literary reference or two and this story contains an abundance ranging from the classics to more modern favorites. The only aspect of the story that fell a little flat for me was the love interest. Overall it was a highly enjoyable read that had me laughing out loud and smiling my way through.

Thank you to Netgalley for the digital ARC of this book. Although I enjoyed reading The Bookish Life of Nina Hill,I found it was to some large extent a book in need of a editor. Parts of the story are charming and witty, but there is a lack consistency with respect to the focus of the narrative and there are also way too many plot lines (family, romance, career, health issues,...), some of which receive short shrift. The best: Nina's trivia team, her new found family, and her sardonic cat. The least effective is the romantic storyline which feels canned. Nina's mother also makes too brief an appearance for such a key character; that story line remains unresolved.

Quirky characters -- I had to give this book some time before I could get into caring about the characters, but once I did, I really enjoyed it. Would recommend this to library readers. It appeals to different generations, which is always good.

I love books with characters who love books, so I really enjoyed that aspect of this story. It was also nice to have a main character with anxiety issues to give the reader a glimpse of what that is like. The story was cute, but the romance aspect didn't really work well and I got a little frustrated with Nina always needing to be rescued.

I thought this was a fun novel. Everything from the cover to the characters to the writing. I know the patrons at my library will love it, so I've already got a few copies on order. Thank you so much!

Absolutely loved this funny, quirky sort of Nina, a book lover and loner until she discovers she has an extended family of brothers and sisters. Anxiety plagues her but she is a planner and routinized until she meets Tom at a Trivia night, and begins to meet her family members. At times laugh out loud funny while heartwarming,, unique and highly recommended.

Another reviewer mentioned that the third person narrator is what killed it for them, and I wholly agree. Nina's story felt flat and predictable

I wanted to love this book way more than I did but I just found it very slow. This really appealed to me because like Nina I also work at a bookstore but I just didn’t feel a connection to the main character. I did like that the characters had quirks and felt really unique which I think has been a big trend the last two years. Overall it was okay but I’m not in love.

(Sorry I just put this in the notes on the last page) -

This book just was not for me. The narrative voice was not appealing to me in any way. The narrator wanted so much to be my friend and used snarky asides to try to make me think she was hip and with it. But instead, she just got on my nerves. I could not relate to the way in which the author made fun of her protagonist's neighborhood by naming every child that came into the bookstore something ridiculous (like Elephantine). I understand that she was trying to show us how pretentious the neighborhood was but then Nina was not very self-aware since, I mean really, how pretentious do you have to be to live in that kind of neighborhood with your mother's amazing secondhand furniture that you just happened into. Also, Nina just didn't strike me as an actual bookish person. I just could not make myself stick with this book until the end.

I enjoyed this book as a nice rainy day read. I liked the cover art and the book description intrigued me. I could really relate to Nina and her life. Being bookish and a little socially awkward is something I can connect with. I liked seeing Nina interacting with her new extended family. I wished the romance between Nina and Tom had been better. Felt a little lackluster. Overall a cute read that I would recommend.

Book nerd. Reading snob. Trivia fanatic. So much fun! I can't wait to buy this book and read it again and again - for the days when you need a pick-me-up. The passages with rambling connections make me feel better about my brain! Authors I've never read have just jumped to the top of the t0-be-read pile (no more than 6 at a time, thank you very much). Nina Hill is a great every-anxious-woman with an incredible backstory. The LA, Larchmont setting is intriguing and I just want to spend a day living Nina's life. Bring on the beach reading, again and again!

A thoroughly enjoyable story of an introvert who finds her personal sphere wildly expanded by the discovery of her paternity. And I loved the reappearance of a character from The Garden of Small Beginnings.

*Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for providing an e-galley in exchange for an honest review.