3.5 stars

If you didn't listen to Edge of Heaven by Wham! while reading this book, you were missing out. I'm now a little bit scared that it will be in my Spotify Top plays of 2021.

Nina George (Michael) Jean is a published author of cookbooks, a columnist and.... a single thirty-something. Actually, he is still friends with her ex-partner and not all bothered about his new relationship. She is currently in that odd stage of life, most friends are getting married, purchasing a house in the suburbs with their 2.5 kids and labrador named Gus. She lives in her own apartment in London with a nuisance neighbour, struggling with her latest book and managing her elderly father dealing with a complex illness. Oh, and there is the mysterious Max, from the app Linx.

Nina is a wonderful narrator. The modern-day Bridget Jones, without the spanx (because who needs them!) and the ugly Christmas jumper. She is Laugh Out Loud funny, witty, and has the most interesting point of view about her crossroads in life. I related to her strained relationships with old friends who have moved on and her complex nature of watching her parents grow older. Her bestie Lola is comedy relief, Hilarious (with a capital H) and I can picture Vanessa Kirby playing her.

I enjoyed the majority of Alderton's book but would have loved to rate it higher. It truly one for fans of the 90s and 00s romantic comedy genre. I adored the strong beginning and ending chapters. There was just something lacking 3/4 of the way. Without spoilers, I was just disappointed about her interactions with a nemesis character, I would have liked to see a less, clear-cut resolution. However, I very much enjoyed diving into Nina's world for a few days and I'm looking forward to Alderton's next book.

Thank you, NetGalley and Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group for providing me with a copy of this great text, for my honest feedback and opinions. I love the cover of this addition, a perfect addition to a Summer TBR.

Ehh.... Sometimes it is best to leave things as is: if it's not broken, do not try to fix it! This goes for our lives too. If you are having time of your life, your relationships are strong and you have nothing that makes you question yourself and your self worth; I think you are in a good spot. No need to jump on that dating app bandwagon and start minimizing yourself and your value based on how few idiots decided to act.

Nina was happy. She was very successful compared to many people her age. She had her issues too such as her father's declining health and her mother's interesting ways to cope with the situation, but she was still in a good place to figure things out. Until she decided that it was a great idea to go on a dating app to find someone.... Carefree and confident Nina was gone with the wind!

Ghosts is a light-hearted story of modern day relationships and makes you feel like I'm not the only person who is doing these things. If you are up for quick read that will make you laugh and cry at the same time, go for it.

I found this book to be an enjoyable fun read. While the premise of the book is about online dating, I found it to be more about life in your 30s and the changes that happen with friends getting married and having children, as well as parents aging. Anyone who has done online dating will appreciate the humor and wit the author uses to describe dating, thinking you've found the one, and the horrible feelings one goes through when ghosted. I loved when Nina confronts Jethro about how he treated Lola. Not sure anyone would do that in real life but it's what we all hoped a friend would do for us!

3 to 3.5 stars
There is humor in this novel about 32-year-old Nina Dean, a successful food writer who just bought her own place. While Nina is likeable as are her friends, some aspects of the story are predictable, and I never felt her love for Max, a man she meets through an online dating app. I did think the author did a good job describing Nina’s relationship with her parents and portraying how friendships change with marriage and kids.

Thanks to NetGalley for the opportunity this novel, which RELEASES AUGUST 3, 2021.

Nina Dean has a full life, She owns a flat in a great old house in London and has a successful career as an author of 2 cookbooks, Nina also has a group of friends to go out to the pub with, Even though she is one of the few individuals in her group that is single, she has not dated since the breakup with her long-term boyfriend. She actually still has a great friendship with her ex-boyfriend. Nina decides that she wants to meet someone so she signs up for one of the internet dating sites. .Nina is very fortunate to meet a great guy as her first date from the site. They are both attracted to each other and have a lot of similar interests.. They dated for a number of months and she was going to introduce him to her parents. The night before he met her parents, he told her that he loved her. And then he ghosted her! This is a great funny book about relationships with family, friends and lovers. I highly recommend this book.

What a whacking great book. Ghosts that's the title of the book. What kind of ghosts. Anything you can think of. There's weird parents, crazy kids and boyfriend's that disappear at the drop of " I love you".
Crazy reading, but lots of fun!

This book was not for me. I found it painful and depressing. The values of the characters were suspect and I ended up being very discouraged by the outcome. I would hope these character 'get a life' and stop making toxic choices.

I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley. The opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own.

This was a wonderful read and made me reflect on so many blessings I have in my life. A joyous read that I would highly recommend.

I’ve been a long-time listener to Dolly Alderton’s podcast The High Low. This book is like all the best conversations from that podcast - it’s about women in their early 30s, the perils of dating, the heartbreak of aging parents, and the beauty of female friendships (both enduring and fleeting). This book will make you laugh and make you cry. Highly recommend.

(Good reads review)
4.5 stars
This book really picked up for me in the second half. An enjoyable story of different kinds of love other than just romantic love, “Ghosts” felt like a close friend. Dolly Alderton is wonderful at weaving the various friendships, parental relationships, and romantic interests into a modern novel of what it’s like to be in your thirties and single. Occasionally I don’t feel as connected to British writers as some forms of convention are at arms length, but Alderton does a wonderful job on describing the lifestyle and feelings of her lead Nina. The relationship between Nina and her best friend Lola cemented my love of this book. Interesting female leads with real life problems and real life solutions kept me reading from page to page. This also was probably the best Epilogue I have ever read (as most leave me feeling like all happy endings mean the protagonist is married with a baby bump)...I will not ruin the ending, but this was truly the best ending for a book I could have imagined. I am definitely interested to read more from Alderton in the future. Thank you to NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

This is a poignant read and I found the story a little depressing. There is not much happiness in this story and felt it unfinished. It is a good read, just don’t expect a warm fuzzy with this one.

I loved the double meaning of the title and felt like Nina is a very relatable character with her family life struggles as well as navigating dating in an online environment. However, I felt the overall plot line to be a little boring.

This is a well written story, the author's writing drew me in and I needed to know how it finished. I like Nina and felt sad for what was happening with her father and disappointed for her because of the boyfriend disappearing on her. Also glad that she had a friend like Lola for mutual support with both of their boyfriend troubles.

There's a lot going on in this story. It was a struggle for me to finish because it jumped all over the place and the many themes offered didn't seem to have resolutions just an oh by the way let me mention this. I just couldn't define structure neither a purpose to connect to.

**Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers at Fig Tree for giving me this gifted ARC in exchange for an honest review!**

3.75

So I want to start with the fact that I did really love this style of writing. I almost felt like I was in Alderton's head/journal as this is a heavy inner-monolouge book. That being said, I am having a hard time with the genre of this book? Is it fiction or is it like a fiction/ self reflection/ almost memoir? I feel as if it wasn't written to be an actual story because although the friendships develop, it was very scattered! It was almost hard to keep up with. Everything stayed within Nina's head and there was a lot of telling me and not showing me, if that makes sense.

BUT, I liked the main character a lot. And I enjoyed that things were not overly-romanticized. I also enjoyed the detail when explaining the other friends/ the "parent couples" and the effort Alderton used to create those characters.

I will for sureeee be buying this book for my bookshelf because this cover art is EVERYTHING.

I gave this book until the 30% mark before I gave up. I jumped to the end to see what happened but I could not get into the story. I did not connect with the characters and I found the writing to be superfluous and the dialogue annoying. I get what the author was trying to accomplish but this was a total miss for me.

I had a hard time with this book. I understand having unlikeable characters but, this was just not palatable at all.

I don’t know why but, I’m not a fan of books being pushed as highly anticipated. We rush to read them and find ourselves disappointed time and time again.

Really enjoyed this read by Dolly Alderton. Nice insight without being too flippant or too depressing. Looking forward to exploring more of her books. Thanks to Netgalley for the opportunity to read this book

This book had some funny moments and moments that I enjoyed but I am not quite sure that I liked it, I didn't dislike it but I still can't say that I liked it. The main characters were interesting but I didn't feel a connection with them, I wasn't rooting for or against them. I think the problem may have been that too many of the common tropes were used. I will give the author another chance because I think she has potential.


Thank you, NetGalley for the chance to read this book!

The inter-personal relationships between the characters were written exceptionally well, Alderton seems to actually understand human behavior and language. Starts a bit slowly, but picks up speed pretty quickly. Alderton's style feels similar to Sally Rooney's, so if you aren't into reading about little details and small pieces of characters' lives, this won't work for you -- but it worked exceptionally well for me.