https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/50042494-ghosts

A solid debut novel, enjoyed it more than her previous biography. It’s an easy read, addresses current issues surrounding dating in a touching and human way.

A good beach read.

As a huge fan of Dolly Alderton's 'Everything I Know About Love', I was really interested to see how I would find her first foray into fiction. I absolutely loved the book, so I hope she writes many more!

In the same way that Alderton's non-fiction managed to be both witty and heartbreaking when it comes to tales of love and loss, this novel hits many of the same nerves, but deftly weaves together the losses we experience from childhood to adulthood with those of lost romantic loves. Nina has forged a successful career as a food writer, but the rest of her life is not running quite so smoothly. Although the split was amicable and they still have a warm friendship, her long term relationship has broken down, her father is in the early stages of dementia and her friends all seem to be moving to the countryside and having babies.

Following Nina as she cautiously enters the dating world, tries to manage the grief of losing her father to a mental abyss and maintain friendships with cracks appearing at the seams, this is a brilliant, painful and touching book. I found it landed somewhere between what might be called "chick lit" (although I hate that term) and more literary fiction, with the added meat of the storyline of Nina's father. Really enjoyable read, can't wait to read what she writes next!

After reading Alderton’s non fiction I couldn’t wait to dive into her first fiction and it didn’t disappoint. A compelling and well written read that I would recommend to anyone who has read her other works

I absolutely tore through this book about Nina, a single writer who decides to start looking for love again. As someone who has been coupled up for the last twenty years, this book was a learning for me on how different perception and reality is for women in their 30s if they're single or coupled up.

A bit like Bridget Jones, Nina and her terminally-single, hot friend Lola spend time on dating apps trying to meet men but also navigating the complexities of trying to socialise with people whose lives are dictated by childcare and location. Nina strikes lucky on her very first date and meets rugged accountant Max and they fall in love. It seems meant to be.

However warning signs appear even early on and things aren't right when she introduces him to her long-term ex who is getting married and she'll be an usher. After an intense day, with her father who has dementia, Max tells her he loves her and then ghosts her completely for 3 months.

I really enjoyed this book and would definitely read another by Dolly Alderton

This was a relatable read full of realistic details. The main character was engaging and compelling. Overall I enjoyed reading this.

This is a voluntary and honest review for an advanced copy from NetGalley.

I have to admit when i started to read this book i wondered if perhaps, being in my late fifties, i was in the wrong age bracket.......not at all. Having a daughter almost thirty i could relate to so much of this book. Not only that, i could relate to so many other situations and emotions told in this story.

This book plays on every emotion. I found it funny, sad and in some places i was so outraged it made me want to shake some of the characters.

I loved the characters in this story, even the ones you are made to dislike. Family, friendships and the life struggles felt real and so did the interaction between them. I could see some of them in my own life.

This story is about life, growing up, growing older and all of life's wonderful but also sometimes messy situations. It is about dreams, aspirations, It is also about life-long friendships that last, through thick and thin.

This book is not a sit on the edge of your seat story but it keeps you interested from start to finish. It is a well written easy read and once started i found it hard to put down. I would absolutely recommend this book.

I first discovered Dolly Alderton through her wonderful non-fiction book 'Everything I Know About Love'. Her candid and witty writing is always engaging and this style translates beautifully to her debut fiction novel 'Ghosts'. Being a similar age to Alderton, I find that the themes she grapples with are perceptive and relatable, skilfully balancing weighty topics with heartwarming moments and biting humour.

In 'Ghosts', we follow Nina George Dean in her 32nd year who is terminally single amongst a group of married friends (with babies galore), experimenting with online dating and all whilst struggling with her father's dementia. The concept of losing a connection with a parent as they age is the most heartbreaking aspect to this book, the story line woven sensitively into Nina's experiences. This is one type of 'ghost' as her father fades away. Alongside this, we have other types of ghosts which come with putting yourself out there and online dating, losing your own identity as you age and growing apart from once close friends. Nina, and her lovely friend Lola, deserve so much more than the awful time they have in this novel, many events being painfully realistic - men do not come out of this book looking great at all (which seems like an unfair generalisation at times).

Overall, I was completely hooked by Nina's story. Alderton's humour hits the mark and is balanced with poignant messages about changing as you grow older and watching loved ones suffer. This is certainly a triumphant fiction debut which I predict is going to be as popular as her prior work. Get your hands on a copy of this as soon as you can!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher who provided an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I often wonder what the landscape of writing might be like had Nora Ephron never existed. 'Ghosts' is a decent enough read (I am not its target market, I suspect) but it is yet another novel that borrows strongly from the Ephron style and subject matter. In this respect, it felt overly familiar which can be good or bad depending on what you are looking for in a novel.

I thought this book was excellent.

Dolly captures the modern 30-something experience perfectly, from horrendous hen-dos to incessant questions about marriage and babies.

She is a really shrewd observer of relationships and the book is filled with realistic portraits of familial bonds, romantic travails and friendships. The scenes between Nina and her dad were particularly tender.

Ghosts is full of humour, heart and hope. It's wonderful.

Nina George Dean is in her early thirties and is a food writer who lives in London.. all her friends seem to be married off apart from her one last single datathon friend Lola.
After pressure she joins Linx a dating app and when she meets Max, who ticks all the boxes and tells her he’s going to marry her after date no 1 she thinks she’s cracked it. Finally.
This is a clever, witty, and sad at times look at life.
The ghosts in Ninas life are not what you’d think.. there are no floaty white sheets here with eyes cut out. No we are talking about the ghost of her father who newly diagnosed with dementia, being ghosted by men in the dating sense, and slowly vanishing friendships that once were the epicenter of your life..
These ghosts follow her over the course of a year and we see her looking deeply at what’s important and how she’s ever going to move forward and find happiness again.
Ultimately we never know what’s going on in someone’s head and lots of people live behind a facade.
This one tugs at your heart strings but at the same time has laugh out loud moments.
You know sometimes in life when you think “If I don’t laugh I’ll cry”
This sums this book up for me.


Thanks for the advanced copy Netgalley and Penguin. The book is published on the 15th October

There are lots of things to like about this novel, including the sensitive coverage of a parent slipping away into Dementia, and the way that friendships change over time as those in their 30's reach different life stages at different times.

I'm afraid for me though, far from the humorous look at the 'joys' of online dating that I had seen the book described as, I found most of the story to be depressing, and an incredibly good reason to stay well clear of dating apps!

Thanks to Netgalley for an early review copy.

I wasn't sure I was going to like this book to begin with, wondering if it was going to feel a bit 'lightweight', however, as soon as I started to get to know Nina I began to like her and care about her. In particular, her relationship with her parents was very real and touching and her friendship with Lola was laugh-out-loud funny. I was also convinced by the situation with Joe and Lucy and Nina's part in their marriage. I didn't really feel I got to grips with Max's character, although maybe that was intentional. I certainly highlighted passages of the book, particularly Lola's comments on age towards the end which I thought were very perceptive.

Dolly Alderton's Ghosts is a year in the life and lovelife of 32 year old Nina. It is in many ways similar to.her memoir 'Everything I know about love' in its preoccupations with love and dating in the 21st century. So readers will find themselves on largely familiar ground.

Firstly I will say that i absolutely romped through this book; I read it in 24 hours. The author is very relatable and always readable; she writes with great pace and she is very, very good with dialogue. The brief text exchange depicting the 'ghosting'of Nina by Max is SO well done. So I do think that Dolly Alderton will be a very good writer . But perhaps she is not quite there yet. For a start, there is a bit too much Dolly in this novel for the protagonist, Nina, to really stand up on her own. I felt the tone was so similar to 'Everything I know.....' that I was actually reading about Dolly herself and not Njna. It is so very specific to an age (30 somethings in the 2010s) and a place ( London), that Nina's gripes and observations about life are not always relatable. This is not helped by the fact that Nina herself is rather bland and undefined- she's a food writer , and ex English teacher but seems to have no actual passion for food or literature.. She is basically defined only in terms of her friendships and her lovelife.. Having said that, both friendships and relationships are convincingly portrayed.

I also felt that the novel misses an opportunity for a more nuamced portrayal of an older woman - Nina's mother. She's presented as a self-absorbed, menopausal, zumba/ book club caricature , a figure of fun - when she actually could have been something much more interesting. Ghosts is a good read but could have been even better.

Thanks to netgalley for the chance to read this book.

Although Nina Dean Is a successful writer her live life is non existent following her break up with Joe. She signs up to a dating app and meets Max who on their first date tells Nina he will marry her. After a few months of dating he ghosts her. He returns months later and she gives him another chance. Will they end up with their happily ever after or will he ghost her again.

Disclaimer: Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin for approving me for this arc in exchange for an honest review.

I wanted to read this book purely because I’ve heard great things about Dolly Alderton’s non fiction work, so when I saw ‘Ghosts’ available to request, I thought why not.

It’s the first time in a long time where I didn’t read the blurb and just went into the book not having any idea what it was about. Initially I wasn’t sure I’d enjoy it but ended up loving this book so much.

I’m not 30 yet...not too far off but regardless there were parts of Nina that I really related to. She’s the woman that is always there for others when they’re not quite there for her, she’s the fixer in most scenarios and loves fiercely.

Any moment between Nina and Bill made me emotional, I think the way Dolly wrote Bill and the progression of his dementia was really well done and with a lot of thought and compassion. It’s the first time I’ve read anything where dementia is addressed and I think it was done very well and respectfully.

The character of Max...hmm. I know a Max in a few people and I’m not a fan!

As a debut novel, I don’t think Dolly could’ve done any better and I really enjoyed this read.

This was a mediocre read - disappointing as the author's non-fiction was fresh and heart-warming at the time it was released. The character seemed bitter and unlikeable; but the problem doesn't lie in her being unlikeable, it's more that the author seems to have accidentally done that and not noticed at all! She has no personal growth in the book, and relies on the tired trope of single women being SO different to married women with kids that they can barely sustain a friendship. A few witty lines, barely any substance or self-reflection in the character. Would not recommend except to a certain kind of middle-class white woman.

I am a bit of a Dolly obsessive, whatever Dolly writes, I read, whatever Dolly recommends, I buy, so I was quite worried this book could only be a let down. However, I've been in a massive reading rut and this is the only book that's managed to pull me out. It was a gorgeous book full of Dolly's beautiful, descriptive writing, particularly as always when she's describing female friendships.

We follow Nina through a year of her life in a which she is haunted by a myriad of ghosts; the ghosts of what her friendships used to be, her father's wavering memory, the ghosts of what she thought her life would be and of course, the guy who ghosts her. I think the book dealt so well her father's dementia and the idea of being child-free in your 30s, themes I haven't seen much before.

I'll be honest, this isn't a book you read for the plot, so if that's you're thing, maybe give it a miss. It's a book you read for sometimes hilarious and sometimes heartbreaking observations on what it is to be living right now.

I had no doubt that I'd enjoy "Ghosts" by Dolly Alderton, given how much I loved her essay collection "Everything I Know About Love", but I didn't expect to get so totally sucked in and emotionally invested in this rollercoaster of a novel.

The novel takes place over a year of Nina George Dean's life, from her 31st birthday to her 32nd. She is reasonably content when we meet her: she has lots of close friends, owns her own apartment and had quit her teaching job several years back and is about to publish her second cookbook/book of food writing. It is lovely to read this sort of contemporary novel where the person has done all the hard "finding themselves"/"growing up" and is more content where they are. It is also refreshing that Nina likes how she looks and doesn't try to change herself. However, at any or part of life, things are never perfect. Nina's father is starting to lose more and more of his memory, and her mother seems to be more concerned with reinventing himself than looking after him. Nina hasn't had a serious boyfriend since she and her ex Joe split up, and while they are still friends it's strange that he is in a new serious relationship, along with most of her friends who seem to only care about marriage and children. She decides to download a dating app, and at first feels like a queen swiping through all the eligible bachelors, then insanely lucky as she finds the charming Max, until just as things are going brilliantly he seems to just disappear.

Interestingly, we see the "ghosting" in this book through texts only. As Max draws further and further away, I loved that we don't get to see her real thoughts and feelings, but only see her performance of nonchalance until it begins to slowly but surely crack. This side of modern dating felt horribly real, and seeing it from the "outside" is a real reminder of how little you can know someone you've been seeing, how easy it is for meaning to be misconstrued in a text message and how people think they can use online dating like online shopping, with no one's real feelings hurt if you don't have to say what you want to their face.

Alderton pulls no punches with this book. It is witty and charming in its quick little observations about "modern life" as it were, but sharp and verging on mean at others, which reminded me of Norah Ephron's style quite a bit (especially as her character in "Heartburn" is a food writer!). No one is really safe through Nina's eyes (I say Nina, knowing Alderton may at times use her as a mouth piece, but also that Nina as a character is very insightful and at times resentful.) She has some really biting lines about the women she is friends with who are agressively defensive of their decision to marry, move out of London and raise children, and don't seem to care what their single friends do until they "eventually" get to that stage themselves. The men Nina meets are at worst cruel manipulators who treat women like toys or tools for self development, and even at best like useless little boys who can't wait to marry a woman who will mother them. Her single friend is subject of plenty of snarky remarks, being a free spirit and a hopeless romantic, and Nina's mother is very often dismissed. However, this book has so much heart too: it shows all these people in good light and bad, and we get to see under the surface of many of them when Nina looks a little deeper and considers their standpoint.

This book felt completely real and I was angry on some characters behalves, wanted to strangle others, and came very close to tears several times while reading the storyline about Nina's parents. The ghosts of the novel are everywhere: not only the now famous concept of "ghosting" a person instead of breaking up with them, but the things that haunt all of the characters. This can be the ghost of a parent you remember from when you were small, memories of your own childhood, of relationships that have ended or completely changed, and all the selves that live inside you as you grow older. I can't believe this astonishingly accomplished, funny and moving novel is only Alderton's first, but I can't wait for many more from her.

Ghosts is out on 15th October.

Ghosts is like reading a fictional version of Everything I Know About Love and listening to a long episode of The High Low. If you enjoy Dolly's columns, and her ramblings on her podcast, then you'll love this.

It's an easy read, with so many quotable, relatable musings on life, love, friendship and generally becoming an adult. The protagonist, Nina is 32, a successful food writer and single again after a long relationship. She's beginning to look for love again, whilst dealing with changing friendships as her friends all take their own paths - moving away or getting married or having kids - and the changing relationship with parents for various reasons.

There are lots of reflections about what her expectations were for her thirties vs where she is now. Even though I am yet to reach my thirties and feel this pressure, the whole perspective on 'adulting' was VERY relatable. And I think that regardless of your age, or where you are in life, everyone will be able to relate to this in some way.

Ghosts tells the story of Nina, a thirty-something single woman living in London and working as a food writer. The book will be right up your street if you love authors like Marian Keyes and Jojo Moyes, but I feel like Dolly has her own strong author's voice that sets her apart.

Nina has just bought her own flat, and is looking forward to a promising career and the launch of her next book. Watching the friends she grew up with marry off and settle down, Nina turns to a dating app in search of love. It's here that she meets Max, and they hit it off almost instantly. That is, before he cuts ties suddenly and with no explanation, leaving Nina hurt, confused, and angry. Trying to process what's happened at the same time as dealing with a father suffering from dementia, Nina is struggling to keep afloat.

I really enjoyed this book. I think it portrayed clearly and with real warmth and humour the reality faced by so many women in their twenties and thirties today. At 32, Nina is feeling the pressure to settle down and start a family, but finds it hard to find time for dating when she's just purchased her first home, is working in a highly pressurised industry, and is trying to be the model friend and daughter. It really showed how hard it can be trying to be everything to everyone, and the pressures we put ourselves under; maintaining friendships into your twenties/thirties once you're out of school and university and everyone is at different stages in their lives takes real effort, effort we didn't have to make when our timetables all looked the same.

I loved the relationship that Nina has with her Dad, and how she comes to accept over time that, rather than not caring, her Mum is struggling to process her husband's illness in her own way. The characters in the book have changed as they've progressed into adulthood, and even changed over the course of the novel, and the narrative shows that that's okay; we have to accept that the people we love will change and grow and we need to be adaptable to that.

Apart from Nina's dad, there aren't really any 'good' or likeable men in the novel. They all seem awful. Despite this, Nina has a really good relationship with her ex-boyfriend, Joe, as they split up in mostly amicable circumstances. It was great to see Nina have this positive relationship with someone she shared such a huge part of her life with, and for her to feel genuinely happy for him as he moved on with someone else.

Finally, I thought the novel was really funny, and there were so many references to modern culture and society. Dolly's voice from Everything I Know About Love really shone through and I think I'd have guessed it was her writing if I didn't know already!

Ghosts was a great novel that I would recommend. The only thing I thought felt slightly out of place was Nina's encounter with her rowdy downstairs neighbour, that I felt seemed slightly out of place. Other than that, a great read and one I absolutely whizzed through. It highlights the importance and value of true friendship, and of home.

Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin (Fig Tree) for the review copy.