Another great read from Abbi Waxman! I love the mother/daughter relationship story and the switch between the different perspectives - sometimes this can make the storytelling hard to follow, but it really added to the story with this book. Thank you, NetGalley, for the ARC!

I liked this book. It is about a teenage daughter and her mother who go across country on a college tour. It was so interesting to hear both points of view in most interactions. Even though my kids aren’t college touring age yet, I can vividly remember doing tours with my parents and thinking the exact same things!!

I received this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. I just love Abbi Waxman. I'm working on becoming a completist for her work. She has such range as a writer, and I have enjoyed it all. This book felt so realistic and honest. I enjoyed it for completely different reasons than I enjoyed The Bookish Life of Nina Hill. Abbi Waxman is an automatic purchase for me!

Another winner from the one and only Abbi Waxman! Told with her signature wit and charm - what's not to love!

I wanted to like this book when I picked it up but I found it to be a bit all over the place. I liked the characters but felt the story moved a bit too slow.

I am a huge fan of anything Abbi Waxman writes, and I Was Told It Would Get Easier is no different! I loved the two POVs and while Emily was the typical dramatic teen she was also funny, heartbreaking and sweet at times. Jessica's POV had me laughing out loud! The plot was realistic, interesting, and heartwarming. I would have liked to have seen a little more from the ending, but overall I loved this one!

Thank you #NetGalley.

I love Abbi Waxman's books. They are a breath of fresh air no matter what she writes about.

This is a book about mothers and daughters, college tours on the East Coast (mostly Ivy league). Jessica is a single, busy lawyer and Emily is 16 and really doesn't know if she really wants to go to college but yet is on this tour.

Along the way they hate each other (teenagers--what do you expect), but yet get along and talk about things (sort of). They meet up with Jessica's friends from college in NY while touring and Emily finds out so much about her mother that she really never knew.

On the tour, she meets some cool guy and has a lot of fun.

In the end, it was a great trip for both of them and Emily decides to do something else totally different which was great.

This was such a read. I loved the snarky back and forth and it made me sit and think about my relationship with my mom. It was cute, fast paced and full of heart. It won’t be a book for everyone but I certainly enjoyed it. Thank you Berkley and Netgalley for my free copy.

This is a great book that has a mother-daughter duo and it's especially fun because nothing goes to plan.

Jessica and Emily are a mother and daughter on a tour of Eastern Seaboard colleges. Told from both perspectives, Jessica and Emily encounter misunderstandings, possibilities, and a future neither can predict. I thoroughly enjoyed this one- as a mother of young adults, I totally empathized with Jessica as she navigates the transition from having somewhat total control over your child's major life choices into having very little control. I'm finding that I love the quirky way Abbi Waxman writes and I look forward to more from her.

This book has been a surprise. I thought the plot would be about something else, but it turned out to be different. I Was Told It Would Get Easier talks about the mother-daughter relationship between Jessica and Emily.

Jessica is a successful lawyer but unfortunately, she doesn't have a good relationship with her daughter and that's why she decides to go on a college tour with Emily to improve their mother-daughter bond. However, not everything goes as planned.

It's been an entertaining read. It's the first time I read a book with this kind of plot. I enjoyed knowing a little more about Jessica's point of view as a mother and knowing how she succeeded in the law field so young and with a child. However, Jessica is a workaholic and her relationship with Emily isn't the best since she doesn't pay her attention.

Emily on the other hand is the typical teenager who doesn't know what to do with her life and complains about her parents all the time. Unfortunately, the character didn't have a good development.

I wish the book gave us more about Emily and Jessica's relationship after the tour because part of the plot was resolved easily and I would've known if their relationship would have remained the same.

This book was different and entertaining, I liked it but didn't love it, although I may read another story written by the author.

I am sorry for not reviewing fully but I don’t have the time to read this at the moment. I believe that it wouldn't benefit you as a publisher or your book if I only skimmed it and wrote a rushed review. Again, I am sorry for not fully reviewing!

I feel badly that I didn't read this book when I first got the ARC-Abbi Waxman is a great writer and this book was pitch perfect for me. Yes, yes I am the target market-middle aged mom with a teenage daughter but it hit on so many issues we middle-aged moms are dealing with. Things have changed so much, and yet so little all at the same time. This book was wry, heartfelt and the dialogue was believable-a huge plus for me! Highly recommend this one to moms of teenagers. Sometimes you need someone who gets it!

I was pleasantly surprised with this one. I really liked Nina Hill and expected a similar story for this one, but a mother/daughter growth story worked and really made me happy to read.

Jessica is an overworked single mother who's been balancing her daughter and her job but letting her job win. Emily reminded me a lot of myself; an in-between person who isn't fully sure what she's capable of doing but also wants the space to figure it out for herself. Jessica is involved in Emily's life despite Emily's want for her to move away from that space and the tension between them and their relationship is palatable from the beginning.

As they journey to different colleges on this weekend tour of the East Coast, not only do Jessica and Emily find out more about themselves, but they find out more about each other. It's obvious that Jessica and Emily didn't have that Lorelai/Rory bond. In fact, it seemed on the verge of blowing up with every snarky comment or eye roll.

But I loved the gradual growth between them. Frankly, I was expecting there to be some bigger adventure that would take Jessica and Emily's experiences to get out of, but it didn't turn out this way. It was a breezy and funny coming-of-age story (and I'm talking about coming-of-age for everyone) and Jessica and Emily do end up with a better relationship at the end.

I was a little annoyed that Jessica and Emily had this rapport that seemed on the brink of tearing, but then you would read their inner thoughts (because the book is written in dual POV) and want for them to just say what they're feeling. However, having been a teenager with a tough relationship with their mom, I understood why there were less said than felt.

I wasn't a fan of all the stuff happening around Jessica and Emily. For example, a school admissions scandal. I'm assuming Abbi Waxman is bringing this up because of the scandals that happened in 2019 with a very prominent school in LA and Abbi being from LA probably wanted to talk about it. The way it was set up felt a bit abrupt and pulled from nowhere. I wished there was a bit more context at the beginning of the novel (and perhaps something Emily is hiding more from Jessica) to bring that scandal into full view by the end. However, there was some interesting things that came out of that part of the book, which I really liked especially the parts discussing how important college is to kids and their parents.

Overall, this was a fun read and reading it on audiobook with the two POVs was excellent. There was a lot of emotions that the narrator put into her characters and it showed when you listen, so highly recommend it if you can get a copy of the audiobook somewhere.

I received a copy of this book from Berkley. My opinions have not been influenced by the publisher or the author.

DNF @ 60%
Thank you to the publisher and netgalley for the opportunity to read and review this title

This is a book I've been trying to get into for months but between the unmemorable characters, the unfunny jokes and references and the boring character dynamics I really can't see myself continuing. I don't necessarily think this book is bad I simply think it's for a different demographic than me, a twenty something whose college application days are far behind her, and whose motherhood days far in front. I just can't connect with the story that's being presented so I think it's time to set this book aside officially.

As the mother of a fifteen-year-old daughter, I could totally relate to much of the mom's experience in this book in terms of parenting a teenager. The transition that happens as your children grow up has been very challenging so there were moments when reading this book that really resonated. I generally love stories about mothers and daughters and this is no exception. I have really enjoyed Abbi Waxman's work and this one is a solid read! The humor and emotional arc of this novel are fantastic. I enjoyed getting to see each of the characters experience the same situations so differently ... so true to life! This novel was very insightful and yet funny. Overall, I'd characterize this novel as a great mix of entertainment and substance!

I Was Told It Would Get Easier is a women's fiction about a realistic mother/daughter relationship. It's told from the perspective of the mother, Jessica, and the daughter, Emily, which makes it easy to see where both are coming from. The book centers around a college tour that is dramatic and eye-opening. I really enjoyed the dialogue between the two and the author's genuine portrayal of a mother/daughter relationship.

There were some tense moments but Abbi Waxman found the right moments to add humor. Some of these parents during the college tours were so childish and bratty but when they were put in their place it was so satisfying.

I give I Was Told It Would Get Easier 4 stars. I thought the duo took a wonderful journey and got to understand each other a little bit better. This was all about family and how mothers and daughters can learn to appreciate their bond. The college tour setting provided a fun and understandable plot that I think readers will enjoy.

I love Abbi Waxman. This one was a bit more serious and not as much dry wit as I am used to for her stories, but it was still enjoyable. I love mother daughter relationship books, so this was a goody for me.

I am a member of the American Library Association Reading List Award Committee. This title was suggested for the 2021 list. It was not nominated for the award. The complete list of winners and shortlisted titles is at <a href="https://rusaupdate.org/2021/02/2021-reading-list-years-best-in-genre-fiction-for-adult-readers/">

Stevie‘s review of I Was Told It Would Get Easier by Abbi Waxman
Women’s Humorous Fiction published by Berkley 16 Jun 20

Although University and College Open Days for prospective students and their parents are a pretty big thing in the UK – at least in more normal times – I don’t think I’ve ever heard of a company organising a tour to take in as many of them as possible for a large group of prospects. Obviously, colleges in the US are more widely spaced out, so it seems logical that this type of experience would be more common over there. Successful West Coast lawyer and single mother Jessica Burnstein has booked to go on one such tour – of East Coast colleges – with her daughter Emily, hoping to meet up with various old friends and family members along the way. Emily is less than thrilled with the idea, feeling unsure of whether she wants to go to college and also convinced that her mother pays more attention to her job and the younger women in her firm than she ever does to Emily. On the other hand, Emily does need to get away from her school for a couple of weeks, due to a scandal that’s about to break.


We don’t find out the nature of the scandal for a long time, although many hints are dropped about it involving Emily and a number of her classmates, and that it may cause major rifts in a number of her friendships. There are new friends to be made on the tour, however, as well as old enemies to face. The most notable of the former are the owner of a construction company and his son, while the latter take the form of a past classmate of Emily, along with her mother. The tour is led by another notable character, an overly perky guide, who tries hard to organise social events for her charges with varying degrees of success.

While Emily worries about the situation at school, Jessica is equally concerned about matters at work, where she has handed in her notice in protest at her two mentees not receiving the advancement they deserve, while less accomplished men are being promoted ahead of them. Fortunately for Jessica – and much to the displeasure of Emily, who was looking forward to spending time with her undistracted mother – there are career opportunities to be found at various stops on the tour.

As the tour continues, nerves and tempers get frayed by the various secrets people are keeping, but everyone eventually develops a deeper understanding of each other and of their own future directions in life. While I didn’t enjoy this book as much as the author’s previous novel, the character interactions were highly engaging, and it was interesting to see a different snapshot of US life.

Grade: B