Thanks to NetGalley for this ARC!

Unfortunately this is another disappointing one for me. Completely misadvertised, marked as funny but at no point made me feel even slightly amused. If anything it really mishandled therapeutic settings and dealt with topics that were really sensitive and sad.

Happiness Forever by Adelaide Faith is a strange, meandering exploration of obsession, emotional unraveling, and the quest for healing—but whether it delivers anything truly satisfying is debatable.

The protagonist’s fixation on her ex is intense and all-consuming, to the point where it quickly overshadows much of the book. At first, I was intrigued, thinking this would lead to some meaningful growth or revelation. But as the story went on, it felt like she was just spiraling deeper into her own obsession with very little self-awareness, and it got repetitive fast. Her emotional state clearly needed addressing, which is where the therapist comes in—but that relationship was a whole other level of odd.

The therapist dynamic felt borderline inappropriate at times, and while I can appreciate fiction exploring unconventional or uncomfortable territory, here it just made me roll my eyes more than once. It was hard to know whether I was supposed to take the therapy sessions seriously or view them as satire. Either way, they often pulled me out of the story rather than deepening my connection to it.

What I struggled with most was that despite the clear need for help, the protagonist never really felt like she evolved. Yes, she was weird—and not in the charming, quirky way, but in a way that left me unsure how much I was supposed to empathize or just observe from a distance. I kept waiting for something to click, for her to make a breakthrough or even crash in a meaningful way, but that moment never truly came.

And then came the ending, which—unfortunately—didn’t tie anything together or leave a lasting impression. It just sort of… happened. I closed the book feeling underwhelmed and honestly a bit frustrated. After following such an emotionally chaotic journey, I expected more than an ending that left everything feeling unresolved and stagnant.

That said, Adelaide Faith’s writing style is unique, and she clearly isn’t afraid to dive into messy emotions and flawed characters. There’s an honesty in how she portrays emotional instability, even if it doesn’t always land. For readers who appreciate raw, offbeat character studies and don’t mind a lack of resolution, this might be a compelling read. But for me, Happiness Forever was more confusing than cathartic—and I left it feeling like the story never quite found its footing.

The pathetic and lackluster stepsister to Big Swiss. For a book made out to be about obsession, there was a massive gap where the visceral depth and disgust and enticement of fixation should be. And fine, I get it, a majority (if not all) of obsession can be watered down to pure projection. But when writing about one's obsession, shouldn't we make our point of interest be somewhat interesting at the very least???

The novel's tenor remained unmoving and left me unmoved. I'm all for a character study, but there has to be something to grab onto. Otherwise, it becomes a farce of a protagonist whose stream of consciousness runs dry for any gleam of self-reflection. I found Happiness Forever to be intolerably and uselessly overwrought. It doesn't even matter that I don't understand Sylvie's plights; it's that I don't care to know them at all.

Anyway, there are other books about queer obsession that are so much more fleshed out and enjoyable. Highly recommend Milk Fed, The Adult, and We Do What We Do In the Dark for an actually satiating read.

At the beginning I was unsure if I was going to be annoyed by the narrator but ended up truly appreciating this particular voice. I'm always interested in the odd woman out.

Both simple and complex, melancholy and delightful, Happiness Forever is a book of contradictions, emotions, and Sylvie’s interior life. 

Happiness Forever follows Sylvie as she traverses her life inside and outside of the therapy hour. She is only happy “when she’s in therapy” because “Sylvie is in love with her therapist.” But when the therapist tells Sylvie news of her retirement, will all their progress come undone? 

On one hand, I appreciated how the relationship between Sylvie and the therapist progressed. It never crossed boundaries even if, at times, Sylvie wished it would. The progression of their sessions and all of her thoughts created an interesting and dynamic character in Sylvie.

On the other hand, because of that focus on Sylvie’s interior world, there wasn’t a lot happening. The book is filled with conversations and thoughts/ retellings of conversations. While not inherently a negative aspect, at times it slowed the pace and began to feel stalled. 

It felt like the message of the book got lost in all of Sylvie’s thoughts and, at the end, of reading, I felt dissapointed. The build toward something didn’t reach what I thought where the peak would be. 

Overall, it didn’t quite meet my expectations.

Full review on halfextinguishedthoughts.com

My thanks to Farrar, Straus and Giroux and NetGalley for an ARC.

*1.5 stars

Unfortunately, this book just didn’t hold my attention and interest for that long to the point where I almost DNF’ed it :( I enjoy reading about mental health and obsession so the synopsis intrigued me as it is about a girl obsessed with her therapist however I felt it was very repetitive and there were no stand out scenes for me.

Readers who enjoy books for the vibe and no plot may really like this but it just wasn’t for me! I absolutely love the cover art though!

I didn’t really vibe with Happiness Forever even though I appreciated that it is a quirky and original book. I am sure many of our library patrons will enjoy it.

On paper, Happiness, Forever seemed like it would be right up my alley. I really enjoyed Big Swiss and expected something equally strange, sharp, and queer. Unfortunately, by the 50% mark, nothing had happened to keep my interest, and I genuinely didn’t care to continue.

The book gives off the impression that it’s queer-centered, but the main character’s behavior doesn’t really reflect that compellingly or authentically. Instead of feeling layered or subversive, she just comes across as boring and vaguely unhinged, not in a fun, chaotic way, but in a flat, aimless one.

She’s also supposedly obsessed with her therapist, but the obsession feels hollow. If someone were truly fixated, there’d be rich detail, like remembering the exact scent of their perfume or the way their voice drops when they say something serious. Instead, the attachment feels vague and underdeveloped, which makes it hard to buy into the premise.

This book will definitely resonate with some readers, especially those drawn to quiet, internal narratives, but it just wasn’t for me.

Thank you to NetGalley and FSG for this ARC of Happiness Forever. This review is hard to write, because I wanted so badly to love this book. I did a happy dance when my request was approved. But. But. I have a very high bar for queer fiction, especially literary fiction. I wanted the queerness of the storyline to be front and center, but it wasn't that . . . it was mostly about therapy, and it just so happened that therapist and client were both women. I know, it really wasn't as simplistic as all that, but it certainly wasn't as advertised, either. I agree with other reviewers that there was a lot of information dropped (dead mom, compromised dog, random friends) but then that information led the reader nowhere. It was strange in that way.

there were a few lines in this book where i thought "Adelaide, have you been reading my mind, are you writing of me?" because they really touched my inner thoughts and or demons. some things like how Sylvie sees the world and or people. and also how she sees them compared to what she wishes she did or what she yearns to. or dare i say it differing from the people she reads in books. you see! her mind has my mind asking questions.
there are squishy bits to this book that hit my squishy bits. its a deeply open book that i think will resonate with all people. but especially those who have felt a bit iffy at time. but then, for those who have felt too iffy it might be too close. and for those people it might feel a bit raw. there is nothing triggering there is nothing of harm. but its close, its open, and its raw in all the ways that are beautiful when you are able to remove yourself from this wonderful girl who is trying to figure herself out.
it feels beautiful this book. its feels like its cherishing your heart as well as our character. it made me sit in that moment of thought for her. i wanted her to be ok. i wanted the world to offer her a place in it where she could be ok. i was in it for her from the start willing her to find her place.

Sylvie, our 30-year-old protagonist, attends therapy to process significant events in her life: her relationship with her parents before they died, the feelings of inferiority to her attractive peers in grade school, the loss of a boyfriend in her early 20s from a heroin overdose, and her controlling and emotionally abusive partner, Owen. On the surface, her toxic relationship with Owen requires immediate attention in therapy; Sylvie needs to relearn how to make meaningful connections. As with solidified problems that bubble over in adulthood, Sylvie must reach farther back into her childhood to consider the festering antecedents. An additional problem is her fervent attachment to her therapist, whom she sees once a week and lives in her mind rent-free. The therapist—what she wears, how she presents herself, where she lives, what she thinks about Sylvie—preoccupies Sylvie’s life.

Much of Happiness Forever takes place within Sylvie’s therapy sessions. In time, she increasingly dialogues with her new book club gal pal, Chloe, who works as a visual artist. The two women discover their shared appreciation for Pierrot since adolescence. For Sylvie, the pantomime character symbolizes her pining obsession for her therapist, suffering alone and voyeuristically observing others in the “successful world” from a distance. If Sylvie can maintain an independent lifestyle absent from disappointment and endings, she may preserve a sense of control and certainty. But she recognizes the life she wants to live inevitably requires levels of risk; she wants to open herself up to others and find acceptance. The therapist, Chloe, her dog Curtain, and her job slowly help her recalibrate to a healthier understanding of a stable and safe normalcy, yet include space for sadness.

I unintentionally read Happiness Forever in conjunction with Didion’s Notes to John. This odd parallel could have negatively affected my experience of Faith’s debut. What stands out most is this: Didion engages in lucid, two-way dialogues with her therapist; Faith’s severely emotionally stunted main character’s voice carries throughout the therapy sessions. The therapist’s counsel isn’t recorded, likely due to their differing therapy techniques and the clients’ respective challenges. That said, the symbolism in Happiness Forever could shine through more clearly if Faith (a) further developed the ideas or (b) dropped some. Sylvie’s fixation on her therapist, care for Curtain and animals at work, enjoyment of books, and early obsession with Pierrot all muddle together, making it unclear what Faith wanted to highlight. I don’t mind exclusively hearing Sylvie’s interior life (I enjoy a character-led story that lacks movement just fine) as I do the underdeveloped array of symbolic messages. Since this is Faith’s debut, I round up and rate Happiness Forever 1.5 stars.

My thanks to Farrar, Straus and Giroux and NetGalley for an ARC. I shared this review on GoodReads on April 2, 2025 (https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/7527549032).

This is reminiscent of other novels in the genre of thirty something (or twenty something) women at sea but it's distinguished by Sylvie's obsession with the therapist she's seeing to help her cope. Faith does a good job in capturing how Sylvie's mind spins but not in rounding her out in a way that makes the reader care for her. It's a short and to me at least not especially satisfying read. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. Over to others.

This one is for all of us with mental illness! I loved how raw and funny this was. Sometimes you just need a really good novel to remind you that we are all strugging with being a person, and this did just the trick.

Really disliked this book. Could not get into it at all unfortunately. Wish it was more engaging. Disappointed.

A great book for fans of If Only by Vigdis Hjorth and/or My Husband by Maud Ventura. The writing style is distinct from both of those (more serious than My Husband, more spare than If Only), but all together they would be a great Obsession Triptych!

'Happiness Forever' by Adelaide Faith follows our main character Sylvie who has desperately fallen in love with her therapist. While reading this book, I don't think love can full encompasses what she was feeling, yes I do agree it was love it was just a part of it. You can see, our protagonist feeling wary and not thinking straight but also she knows that this can't go anywhere. The conversation she has with her friend, Chloe are also worth mentioning because after awhile Sylvie's feelings towards her therapist is borderline obsession and this is clearly can been seen within the shared dialogue. I think the author tried really well to encapsulate the emptiness one feels after giving yourself to someone and not receiving in the end. I would recommend this book if you are grieving the love you relentless gave to the person and lost yourself in it. It is a slow reading and it does go dry between here and there but all in all 3 stars. Also the cover is gorgeous (and the title) one of the main reasons I picked this book up ;)

“But what if your life just stays small, like mine?”

Brief. insightful, and beautiful.

An absolute banger about therapy, and the small life of the protagonist, Sylvia. Sylvia is obsessed with her therapist and thinks about her all the time when she’s not in a session with her. The author, Adelaide Faith, shows immense talent with her writing, shaping Sylvia as a detached person who keeps her mind from her body, unable to truly express what she’s feeling as a person. Faith’s spectacular prose and wit crafts her character Sylvia as an interesting “artifact” to learn about. Her ability to make you feel Sylvia’s pain and distraught is mind boggling and quite unique. She crafts this story in shorts vignettes or chapters where Sylvia is in a session with her beloved therapist, while you learn more about this odd character in a way that keeps your attention. I loved it.

I loved the premise of this book: a woman is obsessed with her therapist. The execution did not hit for me as I felt myself waiting for something to happen. and, at times, it felt like a slog to get through. However, I find myself very intrigued by the descriptions surrounding the vet life as its something I don't know a lot about

Sylvie is obsessed with her therapist. Not like fascinated but obsessed like she wants to spend 24-7 with her, thinks about her hundreds of times a day, stops herself from texting her nonstop. Wishes she could be her dog. And on and on.

This story is mostly about how Sylvie's obsession and therapy sessions. I can't decide if I liked it or not but there were a few sections that really spoke to me:

“Exactly. It’s hard when you see other people from the outside but you only know yourself from the inside. It’s so hard to compare.”

“Well, you are seeing the inside of a person when you’re reading … you get to see their thoughts, not just the outside of them. And maybe you find that easier to relate to.” “Right,” Sylvie says. “It reminds me of your idea of videoing yourself so you can see yourself as a person,” the therapist says, “but the other way round.” “I’m seeing other people the way I see myself, from the inside,” Sylvie says. “It’s probably why a lot of people read—for human connection.”

“It can feel easier to give your life over to someone else and have them make your decisions for you. But I don’t think that will work for you in the long run. At some point you will want to make the decisions yourself, for your life to seem real and true to you.”

“Maybe a novel seems appealing because a novel has already been written,” the therapist says. “All the decisions have been made. You get to just see things unfold. But in life, you have to face the unknown and make decisions. It can be hard, but that’s what life is like for everybody. It’s all the unknown. Nobody knows what is going to happen.”

I loved these little gems.

with gratitude to netgalley and Farrar, Straus and Giroux for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review

A story about Sylvie and her obsession with her therapist but mostly a story about rebuilding and identity. It was very interesting to step inside Sylvie’s world and associate with a character and a thought process that was in some ways very foreign to me and in some ways I think entirely relatable to most of us. I did love experiencing her therapy sessions live and to consider the role of the therapist, especially in true acceptance vs correcting delusions?

Overall this book fell a little flat for me - 3.6.

Thank you NetGalley for the ARC.