Cover Image: Cult Classic

Cult Classic

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Member Reviews

thank you netgalley and fsg for the digital galley!!! i cannot believe i ignored it for so long, i should be studied

this book was downright delightful. i think i am the target audience for anything even vaguely cult-related, and this is further proof. but aside from the cult stuff, i was deeply invested in lola as a main character. her flaws were realistic and relatable, and i loved the exploration of her psyche. i feel like i've read too many novels where the mc is either all good or all bad, and this polarization does nothing for me as a reader. i want nuance in my leads. it is a real skill to craft a layered character that is gross and cruel but also introspective and willing to change. so props to ms. crosley for that *salute*

this book is also deeply funny; i routinely found myself laughing at sloane crosley's witticisms. like yes, tell me how the cult business model isn't sustainable, i will eat that up. when i wasn't laughing, i was painfully aware of being called out. turns out i can't always laugh through harsh truths delivered through fiction and have to reckon with reality :/ kinda rude tbh

my only real complaint with this book was the pacing. i feel like it was a slow start, but as the plot developed i was fully invested and couldn't turn the pages fast enough. (there were parts where my jaw quite literally dropped because of how shocked i was, so you got me there, sloane.) and like, a slow start isn't even bad. i'm just being picky. the payoff was worth it.

tldr this was a romp with some hidden insights that i will be thinking about for the near future

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Cult Classic was an interesting read. I’m not sure what exactly I was expecting as I went in without reading the full synopsis, only going off of the fact that I had enjoyed past books by this author. While I laughed out loud at some parts, I realized when I was nearing the end of the book that I wasn’t sure what had happened. I listened to the book on audio and am glad that I did this version as I think if I was reading the book myself I would have DNF’d it.
A slightly entertaining read that left me wanting more overall.
Thank you to Farrar, Strous and Giroux and Netgalley for the opportunity to read this in exchange for my honest opinion.

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I was a big fan of Sloane Crosley's previous novel (LOVED IT) and her non-fiction so was excited to read this. It started strong for me when the lead character Lola runs into an ex-boyfriend and the next night she runs into another one! But the novel took a turn when the reason for the coincidences is revealed and the plot became something that didn't interest me as much, with the further run-in's becoming redundant. Still I was engaged enough to finish the book and her unique voice and quips kept me reading until the end.

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I think I got my hopes too high for this one. It was enjoyable for sure, and I loved the setting and atmosphere, but I think I wanted it to hook me more than it did. Overall, enjoyable, but not memorable.

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This was a laugh out loud experience for me, absolutely recommend! I loved every second of it - definitely recommend this book for a fun in-between read.

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Many many thanks to Farrar, Straus, and Giroux; Macmillan; and NetGalley for the e-ARC of this crazy read! I was so excited about this book that I really wanted to get a review out near publication day.
To start off, let's go to one of my favorite lines in this novel: "Romance is the world's oldest cult." I'm inclined to agree with this statement. We are taught from a young age that love and romance are one of the core quests of personhood and that they are vital for our longterm happiness and satisfaction. How do we know this is true? Does friendship and passion for other things in life fail to provide that same satiety upon attainment? Potentially not. I'm not totally decided. I'm also living in the society that has appointed love as one of its favorite inventions. So I'm not without bias. And romances, including several notable ones of which I have been part, can be so all-consuming that one can struggle to see the point of anything on the edges of that love. The leader (either you or your partner or the two of you as one conjoined being) sucks the glow out of anything that isn't the relationship, defiles anything threatening to violate the sanctity of the coupling. And, once one emerges from the rubble of what once sustained them, the world looks totally changed, like you are a time capsule from just before you fell into whatever it was that you were in. Frankly, it's terrifying.
This novel almost counts as a romance novel because it is the aggregated recollection of all protagonist Lola's relationships prior to her engagement to a man mysteriously nicknamed (and only referred to as) Boots. After a few chance encounters with exes in New York City's rapidly-gentrifying Chinatown neighborhood on consecutive days, Lola falls into the world of her former boss and several coworkers, who have somehow created a cult-like following of people who's only goal is closure (????? why????) with former romantic partners.
This novel was sort of a more predictable Ghosts-of-Girlfriends-Past version of Freaky Friday. It became somewhat redundant because we knew that we were going to meet someone who Lola had been with, that it would be awkward, and that we would learn very little about the importance of that person. Sometimes, multiple people were only given a paragraph each in a long line of these men. I couldn't tell if the reader was supposed to conjure meaning out of the sheer number of men (and if so, what does that say about others of us with high body counts?) or read them and forget about them. Should we track them? Make a spreadsheet of what Lola could have (but ultimately didn't) learn from each of them? Unclear.
The most illuminating thing that any of them said was that "To not know you is to love you." I think that highlights the sublime of meeting someone new, not knowing where things are going, overlooking any potential flaw or ick because everything is green and wonderful and full of possibilities. But love is, as the novel also states, "agreeing to live in someone else's narrative." Too often we try to fit ourselves into the lives of others without contemplating what we lose of ourselves when we do that. The thing that pissed me off the most about this novel, though, was that Lola literally tries to get out of a toxic relationship, so toxic that this person is literally controlling her, and she doesn't leave him. I find stories like that borderline unforgivable and too real to count as fiction, no matter what kind of other literal mind control is happening. So problematic!!!!
In summation, this book was just okay but I hated the ending, which is my right, as someone who almost exclusively loves the beginning and middle of a book and finds a reason to detest it 95% of the way through.
As I said, I've never wanted relationship closure that bad like ever. Just ghost me and let me get over it. To force someone into encountering that many exes in a row? Criminal. For instance: Last summer, I was driving home from Whole Foods when I saw an ex walking down my block, directly past my building, looking up AT my bedroom window. He'd been there before only once or twice and lived in the boonies of Colorado or something at that time. We hadn't spoken since we split 3.5 years prior and I hadn't seen him in almost 4 (the demise of the LDR). When I chased him down the street to say hello and ask him what he was doing in my city, let alone in front of my house, he was like, "OH! I wondered why this area looked kind of familiar to me." And then tried to ask me how I "really" was doing. Can you believe men? Just let it lie. Jesus Christ.

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Started but just could not get into the plot line and ended up not finishing. The writing was a little clunky and it was difficult to follow the storyline. I have seen some positive reviews for this since and I love the cover and the premise but the execution felt lacking to me

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While the idea of being haunted by relationships past is a hilarious concept, this one didn’t quite work for me. It’s not a total dud, I laughed out loud in several places, but it just seemed to go off the rails a bit towards the end.

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This book truly had it all- fun, excitement, weird and scary. I very much enjoyed the story and the writing. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher!

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wry and funny and way more cerebral than i expected it would be. i cannot emphasize enough how funny i found it. maybe that's just my sense of humor

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I’m on the fence about this novel. The synopsis was very promising, but the actual execution of the whole cult angle was off. Maybe that’s my problem. I love (LOVE) reading about cults, so I was hoping for more. I also love the idea of confronting a string of exes for the sake of closure, but I enjoyed the way it was handled in High Fidelity much more. The story was funny, dark, original, and sharp. I just wasn’t engaged.

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Reading the description of this book I thought I might be in for something along the lines of the 1985 film, After Hours.
Lola is a hip, modern New Yorker. She's an editor, now in her early 30's. She's had her string of boyfriends and lovers but is currently living a boyfriend whom she will be marrying soon.

On one particular night out with some friends Lola steps away from the gathering to pick up a pack of cigarettes when she runs into an old boyfriend - someone she hasn't thought about in a very long time. The timing, however, creates some anxiety as Lola is currently in a relationship with 'Boots' and she's been stressing over whether or not this is 'the one' - the potential life-long marriage. Of course, running into this old boyfriend now prompts her to consider and compare.

But as the evening wears on, Lola continues to run into ex-boyfriends (and she's had quite a few). The meetings all feel as though they are chance encounters, but what are the odds that she should run into so many just at the time she is considering a life-changing moment? Slim, of course, but what could be behind it? There is indeed something at play, a cult, oddly enough. A cult of ex-boyfriends? Could it be?

As Lola continues her odd night of encounters, she realizes she has fewer and fewer reasons to be delaying her wedding to Boots.

I really thought this was going to be a deliciously odd book, right up my alley, but was disappointed in the presentation.

This isn't the exciting, quirky story I was hoping for ... the kind where you eagerly look forward to the next paragraph, the next page, the next chapter, to see what comes next (more quirkiness or a revelation?!). This was a slow, methodical layering of a story. That works often enough, but with an idea so off-the-wall, we need a pace and energy to match, and this does not. Some of this has to do with the language. Author Sloane Crosley writes with a rich, brilliant language, but that actually holds this story back. We get caught up in the prose, or stumble over the prose, instead of the action.

The concept is pretty brilliant ... a cult of ex-boyfriends - and even the over-arcing story of the woman trying to figure out her life and her future life makes for a potentially best-selling book. I think I'd like to see this same concept given to a dozen different writers to see how different the stories would be because I really like the concept.

Looking for a good book? Cult Classic by Sloane Crosley is an off-beat, satire, romance that doesn't quite provide the wit and charm that it promises.

I received a digital copy of this book from the publisher, through Netgalley, in exchange for an honest review.

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Having really enjoyed Sloane Crosley's essay collections, I was curious about her turn to fiction. Cult Classic included the wry and clever turns of phrases that are Crosley's hallmark, and I very much enjoyed the writing and the first portion of the plot.
Lola excuses herself from a dinner in Chinatown with former colleagues to buy cigarettes and runs into an old flame, and from there keeps finding herself back in Chinatown and running into more exes - perplexed by the coincidence, she subsequently discovers they may not be coincidences at all.
It kept me curious as to where it was going, though I was a little perplexed myself the closer to the end I got, and while I appreciated some aspects of the ending, it felt like it went off the rails a little bit. Still would rate a solid 3.

Thank you to NetGalley, the publisher, and author for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.

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This book is definitely for the literary fiction aficionados. If you don't love literary fiction, I don't think this is for you. I liked the book and the storytelling, while often feeling uncomfortable and sometimes confused by the awkwardness and symbolism. You'll either love this one or you won't! There isn't really an in-between!

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This was a pretty funny book, which is not what I expected. It did have its suspenseful twist and turns. The book gave me more of a rom-com feel than a thriller. However, I did enjoy the book a lot. I enjoyed the bond between the characters. Throughout the book, the characters were trying to figure out who they are in the busy city of New York City.

Overall, Cult Classic is a fun read. Definitely not what I expected but overall well-written. I would recommend this book for any rom-com lovers who want a bit of suspense.

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I love Sloane Crosley's voice. I was very excited to get my hands on an early copy of this book and started it, then stopped, then started again, and ultimately DNF. Yet... I liked what I read. I saw another review, which says "This is such a strange book. I liked it, but I didn’t. I was interested in it, but I wasn’t." and no review has ever said exactly what I was thinking better. The concept, the characters, the writing, the wit -- all the ingredients are there. I'd even recommend this to others. I'm disappointed in myself for not finishing it. But for me, at a certain point, I just felt done with it. Is this the strangest review I've ever written? Yes. Did I hate this book? Absolutely not. I genuinely don't know what to do with my feelings about it and can't figure out why I couldn't finish it. The writing is gorgeous and I'm a Crosley fan! So, yes, I think you should read it. I hope you love it. Tell me how it ends.

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Instantly intriguing. The author’s grasp and explanation of Lola’s psyche and POV are spot on!
Sarcasm and reluctant elf-reflection? Relatable.
If you’re a bit cynical and appreciate your humor on the dark-ish side, you will enjoy this read.

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This was such a darkly fun, satirical, wild, and clever ride but ultimately I just didn't care. I mostly enjoyed it while I was reading it but when I put the book down I was over it. I'm giving it 4 stars though for me it's more of a 2 star because I think it will be a banger for the right reader. It's very busy and drags in parts and I think that was my biggest issue with it. If the writing had been scaled down, I think I would have loved it.

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The title and description of this book made it sound so interesting! Lola is at dinner with some former colleagues from a now defunct magazine but she steps out to get some cigarettes and runs into an ex, which isn't unusual, even in a large city like New York. Then she runs into another ex, and another and it starts to feel a bit weird. She then finds out that one of her friends and her editor from the magazine have set up a cult-like group that is focusing on creating closure through commerce. They'll sell you packages that will help with all your angsty issues and they're using Lola and her many exes as a test case. As usual, cult like behavior screws up everything and Lola winds up overly stressed about running into all these exes and the impact it's having on her life and lackluster engagement.

I won't say I liked this book or that I disliked it. I think the only reason I finished it is because when I was about to give it up because I was bored and annoyed I realized i was halfway through and should just tough it out to see if it got bettter (it didn't). I think I'm also getting tired of the trope of New Yorkers being shitty people who are never satisfied so they feel they can be shitty friends and companions. Also, stop with the ability to live in the city with the combined salaries of a glass-blower and writer for an online website, even in the crappiest of crap holes without 15 roommates in 200 sq. ft.

Thanks to NetGalley & Farrar, Straus and Giroux for the free e-book.

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I’m a huge fan of Sloane Crosley’s essay collections and was really excited to check-out her work in fiction. The plot summary for this one evoked Mona Awad (but maybe even more weird!) but was entirely it’s own thing.

The way that Crosley juxtaposes ex-boyfriend troubles and cult troubles in this story is really special. She explores the ways in which we editorialize our memories in order to make something meaningful in a way that is both haunting and hilarious.

This book felt like if a horror film decided to become a pop song, and I loved it.

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