This was a witty and at times surreal story.

I didn't find our main character particularly likeable, but I also didn't feel like I really knew her. That said, the prose was solid and the book made me laugh.

I'm not entirely sure it did what it intended to, but it did take me somewhere unexpected.

My thanks to netgalley and the publisher for a copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

This was a fun read but what started out as an interesting premise exploring how our past relationships can shape and effect us turned into a bizarre exploration of cults and mindfulness which did not hold my attention.

Like Black Mirror, but funny.
Lola runs into her ex-boyfriends again and again and again. What is going on here? A very fresh take on modern love.
It was clever and original, and I loved it.

Bonkers plot, but shot through with Crosley's signature humor. I really enjoyed it in an unexpected way!

I was immediately hooked by the premise of Cult Classic: a speculative, satirical semi rom-com in which New Yorker Lola keeps running into her exes and discovers that she just might be the subject of a very peculiar cult. But I'd seen a few negative reviews of Cult Classic, and I'm sad to say that I largely agreed with them.

Cult aside, I was never sure how seriously I was supposed to take Lola and her world. Although Sloane Crosley is a good writer, Cult Classic felt pithy and witty to the point where it sacrificed all sincerity and character development. None of these people felt real, which was kind of the point, but unfortunately made it a fairly surface-level read. The parts where Lola runs into her exes were fun, and I really liked the effective skewering of the men and their idiosyncrasies. But I was never really interested in the cult itself or how it functioned, and god I found Clive dull to read about.

I'm glad I read this as it was a book that immediately piqued my interest, but it wasn't for me.

Sloane Crosley is mostly known for her successful essay collections, including “I Was Told There Would Be Cake”. Cult Classic is her first novel.

Lola lives in New York and is enjoying a meal out in Chinatown with friends. She pops out to buy cigarettes and bumps into an old boyfriend. An awkward conversation ensues that makes Lola question her current relationship with her fiancé.
Over the course of the next week she continues to encounter old boyfriends and starts to get suspicious. Is it all just a weird coincidence?
Compounding her suspicions is the fact that her quirky best friend and her former boss seem overly invested in these meetings she keeps having. Lola is determined to get to the bottom of what’s happening to her, with surreal and eerie consequences.

I enjoyed this one. The dialogue felt a bit like it was written for a tv show and I can see this story working well in that medium. I enjoyed the somewhat sci-fi twist of this one but it felt like it took a long time to get to the denouement of the story and most of the characters felt (intentionally) irritating to me.

I think this will really appeal to a certain audience, I feel like fans of Lena Dunham’s Girls will love it. I only really dipped in and out of that show, but in this case I really did appreciate the creepy futuristic elements of the story that made it worth reading, in my opinion.

With huge thanks to @netgalley and @bloomsburypublishing for the opportunity to read #CultClassic.

An addictive and wholly original novel - a rom-com with scifi trappings and a great wry, Woody-Allen-esque sense of humour. Loved it!

This was an odd little book that I did not expect to to like as much as I did. It took a little longer for me to get into but I did enjoy it nonetheless. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an advanced copy of the book.

I would struggle to be able to review this book due to issues with the file/download. The issues stopped the flow of the book. The issues are:
- Missing words in the middle of sentences
- Stop/start sentences on different lines
- No clear definition of chapters.

I’m not sure if it was a file/download issue but there were lots of gaps and stops/starts which really ruined the flow. I would love the chance to read a better version as the description of the book appeals to me.

I don't want to give too much away as I think you should go into this not knowing much.
I loved the themes and how they handled them, I absolutely loved the fact it was less your typical romance and more funny and strange.
Wonderful please read it!

Intelligent and fun look at dating now.

I loved Lola, she felt like a very distinct voice and I really enjoyed this book.

It’s a perfect beach read or a nice cosy read.

One night in New York’s Chinatown, Lola bumps into a former boyfriend. The next day, she runs into another. And then another. And another. In what turns out to be a cult-like business experiment, Lola is forced to confront her past relationships in order to assess the viability of her current one.

I’ll be honest, I was drawn to this book mostly by the cover and the title. The actual plot isn’t a huge amount of fun – who wants to repeatedly re-hash past relationships and the reasons why they ended? – but it turned out to be super engrossing and very funny.

Lola is a brilliant heroine. She’s relatable and witty and I really enjoyed her sceptical acceptance of the experiment she has been forced into. I also loved a lot of the other characters, particularly those like Errol and the baristas who were involved in the ‘cult’.

Cult Classic is genre-bending and really difficult to categorise. It’s a tiny bit mystery but revolves around romantic relationships, while the tech aspect makes it a little bit sci-fi/fantasy. The only thing that’s for sure is that this is a contemporary masterpiece.

This is a very modern and fashionable kind of book, a kind of anti-romcom, in which a young woman keeps meeting her ex-boyfriends again, confusing memory and present, love and luck. Unfortunately it just didn’t work for me and I didn’t finish it. I feel it is a younger person’s book.

Sadly, Cult Classics was a DNF for me.

I've never read anything by Sloane Crosley before so I was going in a little bit blind to her writing but I found myself unable to connect with our main character Lola and at times I felt dizzy due to the swift changes in topics or scenes. For me it felt like there was no clear segue or signpost for the changes. We would be talking about Clive then Amos then Boots and I just couldn't keep up.

Cult Classics by Sloan Crosley is available now.

For more information regarding Sloane Crosley (@askanyone) please visit www.sloanecrosley.com.

For more information regarding Bloomsbury Publishing (@BloomsburyBooks) please visit www.bloomsbury.com.

I really liked the premise of this one and it started strongly but something just didn't click with me as it went on my interest waned and I struggled to return to finish this one. I could have just been in the wrong frame of mind when reading.
I did enjoy the humour but I think I just didn't connect with Lola as a character and the cult aspect didn't interest me so the first half of the book was stronger than the second for me. However, there's no doubt Crosley can write and I will check out some of her earlier novels.

I wanted to like this novel, I really, really did, but there was much about it that made it hard like.

It just about managed to remain on the right side of tolerable but that was just because of Crosley’s confident writing. Other than that, this novel had a plot that I didn’t care about (the past relationships of a woman in her thirties) and a central idea that I couldn’t get to grips with.

I suspect it was trying to make some comment about the insidious nature of the wellness industry, how fools and their money are soon parted and also how with a proliferation of insta-gurus and insta-quacks we are all vulnerable to being part of some unregulated experiment. But I just didn’t have the energy to untangle it all. Maybe it wasn’t. I just don’t know. It began to smack of half-hearted magical realism.

The novel’s saving grace is Crosley’s writing which elevates this novel above many others that sit in this genre. Clearly her time as an “essayist” (when did non-political commentators suddenly start calling themselves “essayists”? You’re not William Hazlitt, get over yourselves) has honed her writing style and got rid a lot of the flab that can often plague this kind of novel.

I get the sense that this is a novel that a lot of people feel that they should like, but wouldn’t dare say that it actually left them cold. I am not one of these people.

With thanks to NetGalley for the advance copy in exchange for an honest review.

This is 2.5 rounded down because I was tempted not to finish. The premise and the execution of that idea as a plot with logic isn’t that bad - it does sort of moralise the story at the end. I did however struggle with the main character Lola (who is the narrator) and the narration style in general. If the cult classic is romance, do not be fooled; there is very little romance here masquerading as jaded or cynical it just isn’t very readable. This felt like a slog until the half way point. I simply could neither care about the characters nor revel in their behaviour which I think is where it falls down the most. Even the semi-mystery lacks a compulsive element, but it may just not be my kind of story.

I found this book to be a really quirky and fun little read. The voice of the narrator is very distinctive. The twists and turns in this novel were fantastic. I found this novel was a very fresh take on the complications of relationship and closure.

Romance may be the world’s oldest cult.

If you’re wondering what romance and cults have in common and whether it’s possible for a rom-com to feature a cult, then you have come to the right place.

Lola, engaged to be married to a man only known as “Boots”, has one foot out of the relationship. She is indecisive, keeping a box of every memento from every past relationship, and living in the past. And then, she runs into an ex. In fact, a string of exes and the lines between past and present start to blur. As if this wasn’t bad enough, Lola is not the only one invested in her lovelife. A former boss turned cult-leader has some very real stakes in the outcome.

This novel explores the nature of romance, who you are when you are in love and who you have to sacrifice to keep it (metaphorically, of course!). Crosley looks at the modern ailment of choice when it comes to love, and how most people are only a click away from getting back in contact from a past lover. The heart of this novel is love, but there is nothing soppy about it. The writing is witty and razor sharp, with amusing commentary on romance to capitalist America. Even Crosley’s Goodreads review of the novel is excellent: “Cult Classic features wonderfully clear font, modest margins and straight lines (zero wobbles). I found it to be a smooth reading experience and hope you’ll feel the same.”

The cult aspect of this novel drew me in, but it will definitely be Crosely’s writing and ideas that will keep me on the lookout for her next novel.

Thanks to @Netgalley and @bloomsburypublishing for the arc

The plot was interesting but the entire style was just a complete no for me as the main character is such a downer she is too cynical and bitchy about everything. How is that an enjoyable read?