Stevie Green has made it her business to bring order to other people's lives, even though she's a total mess . Stevie Green has spent her entire life running from herself abandoning cities, jobs and all her belongings at a moments notice. Now after 20 years on the run she is setting roots again in her hometown of La Jolla California . She has a rapidly growing decluttering business and her first 6 months of sobriety in 20 years. The future is looking bright for Stevie Green ; if only she can make sense of her past. This book was a quick and fun read. I found myself nodding along with some of the points the characters made and actually getting some great advice.

Unfortunately, this story was not what I was hoping for. I have a hard time with self-destruction stories and the fact that Stevie Green is on a clear path of destruction for much of her youth was hard to read about. I also felt that it was unclear what the author was going for with genre - was this a love story? A comedy? Or a novel to tackle heavier subjects like addiction and consequence?

This was a quick read, but I, unfortunately, can't say that I walked away with much from it.

I liked the idea of the plot of this book- Stevie Green cleans and declutters other people's stuff for a living while her life is a mess. The execution of the novel, however, fell short for me. Stevie is 37 years old but still obsessed with a scandal that happened in high school. I can understand holding on to difficult life challenges but the drama she is obsessed about is not that serious. I didn't feel like I could connect to anyone in this story and I felt like the story was all over the place.

This is a new book that came out this month. I wanted to read something a bit different than my normal romance novel. I loved Stevie and side characters. This book will give you a story that is not about a second chance, but a moment on how to let go. It brings you some smiles along the journey and a heartache.

Getting Clean with Stevie Green is a story of a woman that has finally learned how to let go and find a life worth living.

*I received a free copy of this novel from NetGalley and Gallery Books for my honest review.*

Stevie Green is struggling through life when her mom asks her to move home and help her sell Stevie's childhood home. Stevie ends up creating a small business helping people to organize and declutter their homes. Stevie has been trying to avoid the things that made her leave after high school in the first place, but she has been home so long that there is no more avoidance. And it's time she came clean with herself about her feelings and how things have continued to affect her.

This was a cute rom-com/coming of age (sort of) story. Stevie ends up learning who was behind things that were done to her in high school and facing her true feelings so that she can live her life honestly and fully. I loved how Stevie and her sister were in competition with an elderly organizer and they were gonna "take her down." And I loved reading who their clients were and how they were helping them. The guy who just bought new clothes instead of washing was quite amusing to me.

This was an enjoyable read for me.

When I first got pitched this book, I was told it was for fans of 'Christina Lauren,' and for those who are unfamiliar with the author duo, they write romance novels. Because I went into this book with the idea I was getting a Christina Lauren-esque book, I will say I was disappointed.

This novel is not a romance; it is definitely more Women's Fiction. I love reading Women's Fiction stories, don't get me wrong. One of my favorite books, Beach Read, could fall into the Women's fiction category. The problem was my expectations for this story were not within reason for what the novel was going to provide me.

I still enjoyed reading about Stevie Green and her mission to declutter her life, but I was expecting the whirlwind romance that a Christina Lauren book offers, and ultimately got a really sad story about a 37 year old women who's life got derailed for 20 years.

I think a more accurate comparison for how to describe this book is maybe for fans of Katherine Center. I think this would more accurately describe what readers can expect when diving into this novel.

This book also covered more serious topics such as addiction so please look up content warnings.

Thank you, Gallery Books and NetGalley, for providing me with this ARC (Advanced Reader's Copy) in exchange for an honest review.

This was a fun, fast read that I really enjoyed. It was chaotic and quirky, in a good way. I like the double meaning of the title, between Stevie’s cleaning business and her struggles with alcohol. There’s maybe even a triple meaning of her cleansing herself of pretending to be someone she’s not. I thought the characters were charming. This would be good for someone with a bit of a dark/sarcastic sense of humor.

Thank you to Gallery Books, NetGalley, and Swan Huntley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.


Stevie Green is thirty-seven years old and her life is a mess. When her mother asks her if she can come and help her with moving it a new house, Stevie, purposeless for most of her life, jumps at an opportunity to be useful. At home in La Jolla, she decides that helping her mom declutter has given her a purpose. When her sister Bonnie moves home, they work together to make a decluttering business work and are highly successful. Unfortunately, Stevie is obsessed with something that happened in high school. It has affected her for most of her life. But with a new purpose in life, she decides to stop drinking and making mistakes with men. But when she is home and seeing her friends from high school, memories begin to haunt her.

In this incredible novel, decluttering is a metaphor for cleaning up your life. Stevie has setbacks and they are very real. This book also deals with heavy topics, such as addiction, sexuality, and alcoholism.

This is a fast-paced read, and I really enjoyed it.

I wasn't able to connect with this book at all. Objectively, the writing is engaging (and smart! And witty!) but for some reason, this is not the story I want to be reading. I'm not investing in it. I keep picking it up and putting it down and forgetting about it, reading other things, and then trying to get back into it. It's not working - so I think this one is just a miss for me.

I sincerely appreciate the opportunity to read and review. Unfortunately, this one was a DNF for me.

Stevie Green can help you declutter and clean up your life, which is amazing since she is an utter mess. At 37 Stevie still hasn't moved on from a drama/trauma that happened in high school. She is holding onto it so much that it has dominated her life since and she has pretty much been blackout drunk sense high school. Stevie has been sober for about 6 months and started a business helping people organize their lives in a hope she might be able to organize herself.

I liked the decluttering parts of the story. Stevie and Bonnie working together, building back the bonds of sisterhood they shared once long ago. I liked meeting their clients and going through how to declutter different rooms in their house or how to decide if you are really going to use something, if it makes the cut or you should throw it out. I found that part of the story the most interesting. Everyone has a reason for holding onto extra stuff they really don't need. It was easy to see that Stevie like most addicts had just traded alcohol for an addiction to becoming number one on an app for cleaning services. But at least that seems a bit healthier.

Stevie herself...well sometimes she was great and I really enjoyed her, but most of the time she is stuck in this cycle of sophomoric behavior. It has been 20 years since the incident in high school and yet, it is still the predominant thought in Stevie's life so much so that when she sees the person she believes is responsible she tells them she forgives them first thing. I also found it so hard to believe that Stevie, at 37, still hadn't figured out her sexuality. But I guess that is what happens when you don't really do anything to grow as a person for 20 years and spend it drinking, blackout drunk or hungover.

I didn't really connect with Stevie, there were times when I really just hated her. But I loved the cleaning, decluttering and clients she had. That part of the book was the best for me and inspired me to have my own Freedom Day when I let some of the stuff in my life weighing me down go.

I had hopes for this book. It sounded different. The story was ok. Stevie left 20 years ago because of an embarrassing situation at school. She comes home and ends up living with her mother and sister. She has a friend she blamed for the incident. Turns out she was wrong about a lot of things. I couldn't connect with any of the characters. I read this on NetGalley. It is my honest opinion.

Blog:
I smashed the request button on NetGalley when I read this description. A mixture of quit lit (literature about addiction and recovery) and decluttering? Sign me up! And it did not disappoint. In fact, it surprised me with delightful queer content I wasn’t expecting.

It’s important to know that Stevie’s ex-best friend Chris is a woman. Chris also came out in high school as a lesbian around the time of the scandal that so traumatized Stevie. Stevie has also slept with women, although only the men are mentioned in the description. The only hang-ups about Stevie’s sexuality seen in her circle of family, friends, and even lovers, come from Stevie herself. This is a great example of how addiction can freeze someone’s self-awareness and self-acceptance. Stevie began drinking in high school, and it’s a trueism in recovery circles that you freeze at the age of development you were at when you began drinking until you stop. Then you can begin maturing again. So is it a bit frustrating that Stevie is 37 and kind of acting like a teenager? Yes. But is it realistic? Also yes.

When we meet Stevie she is newly sober and running her decluttering business. I loved the depiction of how Type A Stevie is about her days and routines. This is so accurate to early recovery. One of my favorite parts is how she starts every day by standing in a Wonder Woman pose and saying affirmations to herself repeatedly.

"How had I become a woman who chanted affirmations to herself while doing this ridiculous pose? Because it was supposed to make me feel better. I would have done anything to feel better."location 806

Early recovery really is this incredible moment of being willing to do anything to feel better, and this is wonderfully depicted here.

The scenes with Stevie decluttering with her clients also shine. I’m a fan of decluttering YouTube videos and tv shows, and these gave me the same thrill as watching those. I loved seeing the variety of types of clutter the clients had, their personalities, and how Stevie interacted with them. She also quickly ends up working with her sister, Bonnie, who is also going through it after her boyfriend of 15 years left her for a younger woman. Bonnie and Stevie have great sisterly chemistry, and her addition to the business helps keep the pace moving forward.

Ultimately, it’s only when Stevie fully faces both her past and her father’s death that she can really begin to heal and move on. I thought this requirement hit her in the right way and with the right force. The pacing of this book really was quite good. And while there’s always the concern when reading queer lit that there will be a tragic ending, don’t worry, readers, there’s a happy ever after for Stevie. This is truly a lighthearted queer romance that also tackles the serious topic of recovery. It was like eating a salted caramel ice cream – sweet with just the right amount of savory.

Instagram:
This was a really fun read! Stevie Green is in early alcohol addiction recovery and starts a decluttering business in her hometown. But an old scandal comes back up just as she is trying to figure out her sexuality. Don’t worry, there’s a queer happy ever after in this one. It was like eating salted caramel ice cream - sweet with just enough salt (the seriousness of recovery) to make it deeper.
Links to my full review, to purchase the book, and to get my book club discussion guide in profile.

GoodReads:
I really enjoyed this one. A mixture of quit lit (literature about addiction and recovery) and decluttering with delightful queer content to boot.

Check out my full review.

Get my book club discussion guide.

*I received a free copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.*

“It’s so hard to know who you are.”

I enjoyed this book but not that much? Love a book about a messy woman, you know, especially messy women who kiss girls. But. It felt like the characters were my age, not ten years older than me, and I just feel like if I was still embroiled in high school drama now I would be endlessly annoyed with myself, not to mention if I was 37. Kind of kept expecting something life-changing to happen and it just did not. Also I did not really like the dialogue in this book. Three stars, but like, two and a half, actually. But we’ll round up for NetGalley.

Getting Clean With Stevie Green
By Swan Huntley

I love imperfect characters – the messier the better. Getting Clean with Stevie Green is a darkly funny, witty read that looks at life on how one woman’s past (a high school scandal) lead down into a rabbit hole of a mess. It is a heavy read, but very hopeful. I love the process of seeing Stevie Green gets cleaned up physically, mentally, and metaphorically.

Stevie Green is a fast paced read with short chapters that moved the story forward. Though the story dealt with issues of alcoholism, sexual identity, and family relationships, I found the story enjoyable and delightful. This was certainly a different read, and I am glad have had the opportunity to read this.

Thank you NetGalley for an advanced copy of GETTING CLEAN WITH STEVIE GREEN by Swan Huntley. I will admit that in the first third of this book I didn't like any of the characters and I thought the book was just going to be about depressing people who made bad decisions and I almost stopped reading. But, I pressed forward and actually ended up getting into it and enjoying myself in the end. I think my favorite part was Stevie's cute Marie Kondo-like cleaning business (even if she hates Marie Kondo) and getting little mini-episodes of her helping her clients clean up their lives. I enjoyed watching her relationship grow between her sister and her mom and her best friend. I enjoyed seeing her grow and realize who she was. I even got a little into the "mystery," even though it wasn't much of a mystery. It still got me wanting to see how things would unfold. So, I guess my advice would be to push past the depressing beginning, because the story and the characters grow on you. At least that's what happened for me.

Considering how many serious topics this book deals with it was surprisingly cute and light. The main character Stevie a recovering alcoholic who moves back in with her mother and aspires to have the number one decluttering business while also dealing with old high school drama and confusion about her sexuality. I actually used to work as a personal organizer and I I found the Getting Clean clients to be realistic If you're reading this and think no one could every be that "fill in the blank". Oh yes they can and are. This whole book has just a sweet quirky vibe. All of the characters felt authentic and were fun to read about.  I'm pretty sure this is meant as a standalone but I wouldn't mind another book set in this universe. 

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for giving me a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review

Overall, I liked this book enough to tip it into 3-star territory. The part of the story that deals with Stevie getting her life back on track and reconnecting with her sister is the good part. But the parts where 30-something adults are still holding on to some b.s. from high school is weird and silly.

Stevie is an alcoholic whose life is a mess in so many ways. When her mother needs help packing up her house, Stevie goes back to her hometown and starts a decluttering business. In helping others straighten up their homes, she begins to fix her own life.

There is a love triangle (but is it love, really?) and a lot of soul searching as Stevie Green proceeds to get herself clean in more ways than one.

My thanks to Gallery Books and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

A very enjoyable read with some surprises that you do not see coming as you follow Stevie Green as she tries to reclaim her life.

I absolutely felt sucked in to Stevie’s story from the very beginning and wholeheartedly agree with Storygraph’s assessment of it as “fast-paced.” As we slowly learn more about Stevie’s past and become invested in her future, other characters from her life chime in to let us know the truth about what really happened back in high school.

Even if I didn’t always agree with her choices, I was rooting for Stevie to be number one in the decluttering business and, more importantly, to find the answer to the question she asks herself in the mirror each morning — “who am I?”

This is my first 5-star read of the year, and so it’s no surprise that I’m going to say I highly recommend it. The writing has a spark of wit and truth to it that had me reaching for a pen to mark off quotes. The story has just the right stakes to keep you invested while also feeling fun.

Lighthearted, quick read. A little basic. If it was any longer or more drawn out I might not have finished. I didn't really like the characters and nothing about the book challenged me.