Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for this ARC!

Overall, I gave 'The Rachel Incident' a 3.5 out of 5 stars.

What I loved:
- Seemingly fast-paced
- Loved the characters, especially the early friendship development between Rachel and James
- Super witty

What I wasn't a fan of:
- Some chapters felt a little long; I definitely had to reread a few things to keep up
- Byrne's wife rubbed me the wrong way. IDK, I can't fully describe it, but she irked me in a lot of ways.

A great read, just a few things I didn't care for! Will recommend this to my friends and followers on Instagram for sure.

This book is primarily set in 2008-2011 Cork, Ireland. The economy is in a terrible recession and Rachel is graduating with an English degree and no job lined up. I was immediately hooked by the writing and deeply invested in Rachel’s love life and the tangled web that her and her best friend James were weaving in the lives of others. The book covers many heavy topics (homophobia, abortion) while also having an amused or amusing tone at times. I’m not totally sure to explain it but I really enjoyed reading it!

A story I was sad to finish, but with a perfect ending. The story watches several characters grow into adulthood, navigating real and important issues in their lives. Middle class privilege, abortion access, and bisexuality play major roles among ordinary people. I loved each and every character and loved watching their decisions, their mistakes, and ultimate redemption. A great, great story by an author I want to read more of. Thank you NetGalley for an ARC.

Try as I might I could not get into this story. I didn’t find any of the characters entertaining nor do I care. From what I read though it was written well but I just couldn’t connect.

This books is a university-aged coming of age story following Rachel in Cork, Ireland. I felt like it captured a lot of the feelings of that age. At times, I felt like this wasn’t necessarily Rachel’s story to tell, but I still found it interesting!

I wanted to love this so much, but the characters were a bit one-note for me and I wasn't compelled to continue reading.

This book was quite lovely. Coming of age story set in Ireland in 2010 dealing with friendship, love and finding your place in the world. It brought back memories of my own youth. All the characters felt so real. They were all flawed in their own ways, but totally relatable. The writing style is compelling and kept me reading late into the night. I did not want to put it down after I started reading. I will definitely be reading more books from this author!

The Rachel Incident follows Rachel Murray as she goes through life learning its many lessons. While finishing college in Cork, Ireland, she meets James Devlin, her co-worker, roommate, and best friend. Rachel develops a crush on her married professor, Dr. Fred Byrne, which leads to an interesting change of events and ends up affecting the life of not just Rachel, but also James, Dr. Byrne, and his wife.

I didn’t expect to enjoy The Rachel Incident as much as I did, but as soon as I started reading it I got sucked into the world of Rachel and James living in post-recession Ireland. I could clearly picture everything as I was reading it, and it felt as if I were there with them.

What I liked about this is although there are who can be considered the protagonists and antagonists, no one was completely good or bad. Even Rachel herself wasn’t the perfect character. But to me, that’s what made it all more believable. It made the characters real people.

I can easily see this book becoming a book club classic. Thank you to Knopf, Pantheon, Vintage, & Anchor, NetGalley, and Caroline O’Donoghue for the eARC.

I had a difficult time connecting to the book. I struggled with Rachel’s decisions and lack of morals. I stopped and started it several times. There were parts that were humorous but most of the time I was shaking my head to why she did what she did. I was glad when Rachel and James moved apart but it was still a struggle for me. Caroline O’Donoghue’s writing style is wonderful, I just struggled with Rachel’s though process. It was to mess for me.
Thank you Caroline O’Donoghue, Knopf, Pantheon, Vintage, & Ancho and NetGalley for an ARC of this novel in exchange for my honest review.

Rachel, a young and lost student working at a bookstore, meets the charming and extroverted James, and they quickly develop a deep friendship. They become roommates and embark on a transformative friendship, navigating the streets of Cork city amidst the impending financial crash. Rachel's crush for her married professor, Dr. Fred Byrne, leads to a complex web of hidden secrets and rising tensions involving James, Rachel, Fred, and Fred's wife.

If you love reading about messy and complicated relationships like in Sally Rooney's "Conversations with Friends" and enjoy books that follow a young protagonist trying to figure out how to navigate adulthood like in Lilly King's "Writers and Lovers", then you will enjoy this book! I loved the exploration of love and friendship in this book. Caroline O'Donoghue was able to create characters who were not black or white, and made decisions that were morally grey however you couldn't help but want the best for them. The writing was sharp and witty and made me laugh so many times! Loved this book and so excited to read more from the author!

Thank you to NetGalley, Knopf, Pantheon, Vintage, & Anchor, and the author for providing me with a digital arc in return for an honest review. The Rachel Incident comes out June 27th!

Had a hard time getting into this book or wanting to return to it. I couldn’t relate to any of the characters and the story swung from fairly mundane to completely out there. The jumping between timelines was also confusing, but that may be because I read a digital ARC so it may make more sense in the final version.

Thanks to netgalley for the advanced reader copy.

What a sweet, sassy little nut of a book this is. Great voice and sensayuma. Deftly woven, with national politics tucked into modern love stories. Not sure I bought the talk of the town stuff, but otherwise it was a treat.,

The Rachel Incident is a coming-of-age story about a young woman learning about relationships while living in Cork, Ireland. It tells a tale of friendship, love, and growing in your early twenties. The book begins with Rachel Murray attending college while working in a bookstore. There she meets her co-worker, James Devlin. Rachel and James become fast friends and decide to move in together. Most people assume that James is gay, but he has never confirmed or denied it. It doesn’t matter to Rachel either way.

While attending college, Rachel develops a crush on her English professor, Dr. Byrne. She finds out that he has authored a book and sets up a book launch at the bookstore she works at. James helps Rachel with the book signing event. Dr. Byrne’s wife, and publisher, Deenie Harrington also helps with the book launch. After the book launch, life begins to become very complex for Rachel.

I highly recommend this book! It reads more like a memoir than fiction. Caroline O’Donoghue writes fully-developed characters that will have you rooting for them. The friendship between Rachel and James is especially compelling. I give it 4/5 stars.

The Rachel Incident is a bittersweet coming of age story about a young woman learning about relationships in Cork, Ireland. I was sent an invitation to read it by the publisher because it’s somewhat similar to Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow - which was my favourite book of 2022 - the email even includes an endorsement by Gabrielle Zevin, and it’s set around a book shop, so how could I resist? Unfortunately, and rather predictably, this doesn’t quite match up - mostly because the characters are not nearly as appealing, but I still became immersed in Rachel’s story and finished it in a day.

Rachel is a heavily pregnant London journalist who is prompted to reflect on the events of her youth by news about an important figure from her past. As a final year English Literature student, she meets James in the bookshop where they both work part time, and they become best friends. Insecure and awkward, she has a huge crush on her married college professor, and together they conspire for her to seduce him a his book launch - but things don’t go according to plan, and the consequences of this end up changing her life…

Other reviewers have compared this to Normal People - with a dash of Bridget Jones’ Diary, and I can see why. Young Rachel’s behaviour is off-putting but poignantly understandable: “On top of all that, he was the only man I’d met who made me feel petite, and to feel protective over someone who physically towers over you is a hell of a drug.” I’m sure we’ve all done things we look back on with shame and regret, and I liked that we do get to meet her all grown up. This is an Irish story so it’s basically about the complicated hypocritical conflicts about sexuality, sexual behaviour, shame, and of course, abortion. The three significant men in her life at the time, James, Fred, and Carey, all behave abysmally, but as ever, the woman is to blame and pays the price. There’s also a lot about the difficulties faced by young people during the financial crisis - middle class Rachel finds herself with an apparently useless degree after struggling to pay for university, a situation which will resonate with many people I imagine.

Thanks to NetGalley and Knopf publishing for the ARC. I am posting this honest review voluntarily.
The Rachel Incident is published on June 27th.

I truly wanted to like The Rachel Incident
by Caroline O'Donoghue but I had a very difficult time with all of Rachel's very poor decision making and how she just couldn't seem to do the right thing with her life. She was taken advantage of by her professor, he was a horrible person and the whole vibe of the novel just put me off. Thank you to the author, publisher and NetGalley for an ARC of this novel in exchange for my honest review.

James and Rachel are the best of friends, if not a bit codependent.

They fulfill each other so completely (except sexually) that their partners have little space to actually be in their lives.

Until James’s affair with Rachel’s married professor explodes in a way that hits Rachel with the shrapnel.

This life changing period drives them apart just enough for them to develop their own lives in different cities but still maintain the friendship.

To be honest, this story would have been so much more interesting with another perspective. Deenie’a particularly.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for this eARC.

Well… I loved this! The more I read the more I loved and became so invested in the characters. There were parts I related to and parts that were very alien to me but I felt so attached to Rachel by the end that I just didn’t want it to finish. There were some parts I found a bit confusing but they appeared to be to do with the proof copy being a bit difficult to decipher in places, with lack of page structure. But honestly I adored this book and I want more!

Rachel is reflecting on the coming of age period of her early 20s. I really enjoyed this book and the characters in it. I thought it was a little rushed at the end since I wanted the story to keep going and was sad when it ended.

the rachel incident is incidentally everything you think it would be while also subverting the expectations you have for where these characters will go and what they will do. you enter this maze of life with rachel and james and none of you really know where you will come out, except for some rachel post-events narration.
not to cheapen with comparison but.. this book is rooney-esque in its mid 20s protagonists living in ireland with little to no direction in their lives, who struggle with money, struggle with love, and struggle with each other; rachel and james are essentially instant best friends, meeting at work and then going on to live together and living vicariously though each other, until things happen to them that they cannot relate to with each other anymore. sharing a mutual crush on a professor, navigating bumpy relationships with others and with each other, trying to find jobs during a recession, james struggling to express his sexuality, rachel struggling to finish university and find out what to do with her life; this story is truly messy. we ride through these bumps, we chide their choices, we imagine what we would do in these impossible scenarios they live through, and we come eventually to a unexpected but satisfying conclusion. despite some suspended disbelief and a few stereotypes, i think for anyone who is a fan of sally rooney, a fan of women lost in their 20s lit, or just loves professor/student drama, this book will be quite enjoyable for you.

for fans of: normal people, beautiful world where are you, my last innocent year, early morning riser, paul, recollections of my non-existence

I wanted to love this book. But it felt like a lot of build up to an “incident” that just didn’t hit for me. The writing style was great, I felt connected to characters, but the climax just fell short for me.