Brilliantly original, Holly Gramazio's book is a time-bending story of continuous choices, multiple possibilities and a trouble with finding the one good for you. Main character is Lauren, whose attic produces new husbands for her. Every time a husband goes up, a new one comes down. But which of them is the best? And who can guarantee that the real catch does not wait one attic away?
I was instantly drawn to this story because of the sheer amazing concept of it –I loved both the idea and the execution. The characters were flawed and believable, and perhaps because of that the book was very engaging. Who doesn’t wonder if the grass isn’t greener somewhere else? Think about this book as a cross between The Time Traveller’s wife and The Groundhog day – there is a humour in it but there is also a vulnerability of the unknown and love and affection. Altogether, a great book, I am looking forward to recommending it to everyone!

Hilarious, unique story about a magic attic and more husbands than anyone would know what to do with. The world needs books like this more than ever now.

After a night out, Lauren comes home to find a strange man in her house who seems to be her husband.

Gradually, Lauren realises that her attic is generating husbands; a new man comes down the ladder every time her ‘husband’ goes into the loft.

The range of men varies endlessly, all a result of possible partners and possible futures with the very occasional repeat.

Focused on how to choose which husband to keep, Lauren begins to realise that the life that comes with that choice is equally important, most especially how it affects the lives of her family and friends.

A quirky groundhog day debut which plays with the concept of ‘The One’.

When Lauren arrives home one night to find a strange man in her flat who claims to be her husband this is just the beginning of a succession of husbands appearing from her attic.
The Husbands is an original and amusing novel, it’s a light and funny read that I enjoyed overall. I did find that it became over long and laboured the point of the endless number of husbands and so I did lose interest at points.
3.5 stars
Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read and review this digital ARC.

Lauren is frightened when she comes home a bit drunk and discover a strange man in her flat. Then she slowly comes to realise he's her husband. Except she isn't married. And she didn't have that furniture before. Or wedding picture. It's when he pops up to the loft for something that things get really strange: there's a flash and a sort of buzzing noise and a different man comes back down the wonky ladder! Each time a new man appears, the rest of Lauren's life tweaks a little - sometimes she has a different job, sometimes a few different friends, she has different relationships with her downstairs neighbours; a few times, her sister doesn't have her beloved niece and nephew and often they're not as close as they were. Some things remain the same, including her best friend's wedding, for which she coincidentally finds she needs that staple of romcoms, a plus-one.

Then she finds that some of the husbands (all of the husbands) still exist in whatever world she goes into - and she even gets some more than once. It takes a while to realise that they're probably indicative of all the paths through life she could have taken, but how does she choose who to stick with, how does she stop the good one going up the ladder, and wait, who's this one who seems to have some experiences in common?

A really fun read and I thought the ending was done well although some found it a bit abrupt.

My blog review: https://librofulltime.wordpress.com/2024/04/13/book-review-holly-gramazio-the-husbands/

What if you could just send your annoying husband up into the attic and a new one would come back down? When Lauren mysteriously finds herself with a husband waiting for her at home after her best friend’s hen party, she makes the discovery that attic seems to magically exchange husbands. Some are quirky, some funny, some plain annoying. Then she begins to wonder whether she’s let Mr Right go.
At first I thought this quirky premise was amusing, however for me it became a bit tedious when Lauren was literally changing husbands more often than you’d change your socks. I somewhat lost the plot and felt like I wasn’t at all sure what the point was: after all, it wasn’t as if the book had begun with her wishing she had a husband. It all felt a bit too shallow for me without any real depth to the characters or the plot, but that said I know lots of other readers have loved this book.
Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an arc in exchange for a review.

Lauren arrives home after a night out to learn she now has a husband, she knows nothing about. Everyone else in her world does though. But after he pops up into the attic and returns as a new husband things get complicated. She now has an apparently endless supply of husbands but what does this mean for her?

THe concept of this was so interesting and it carried it off for the most part. Its kind of a slow build despite the rapid changing husbands. The ending whilst not quite what I wanted, I think actually worked really well for the book. It was a dramatic but perfect conclusion. This book at times had me laughing and others wanting to tear my hair out. One minute i was thinking Lauren you need help and yet I still wanted her to succeed with her plans. I would have liked to have known a few of the husbands more but I think it worked not knowing most of them. The plot flows well and I loved Bohai. A fun story that does make you question how far could you go for perfection?

I didn't know what to expect from this one going in but I was pleasantly surprised by how funny some of the moments in it were. I loved meeting all the different husbands and found it so interesting how different all the men Lauren could have married were. I would recommend this one if you are looking for just a fun read, that is quite different from anything else

If you enjoyed "The Time Travellers Wife" you will love this book. Lauren discovers her attic can create an endless supply of husbands for her which she can change simply by sending them back there.

It is the best and funniest read that I have had for ages, brilliant plot and satisfactory ending.

While not sure what to expect, I really liked the concept of The Husbands. Perpetually single Lauren returns home one day to find that her attic is generating husbands. She and these men have chosen each other in this version of her life - the way she has chosen her job and they have decorated her flat. There are some interesting constants in each version, especially her downstairs neighbours’ relationship, but ultimately not enough for Lauren to gain any insights into what she wants and what she’s actually looking for.

When a husband seems too eager to get back into the attic, they realise that they’re both living the same strange existence, which makes it less lonely. I think it is the fear of ending up like him that finally makes Lauren make the choice that she does - one which made sense despite being rather extreme!

For me, the pace dipped a little in the middle and I think we could have cut a few husbands out to shorten the book just a little. But otherwise, an enjoyable read!

3.5 stars rounded down

💜🪜𝔹𝕠𝕠𝕜 𝕊𝕡𝕠𝕥𝕝𝕚𝕘𝕙𝕥🪜💜
𝓣𝓱𝓮 𝓗𝓾𝓼𝓫𝓪𝓷𝓭𝓼 𝓫𝔂 𝓗𝓸𝓵𝓵𝔂 𝓖𝓻𝓪𝓶𝓪𝔃𝓲𝓸

The Husbands is an outrageously funny, original, quirky debut. The time-bending attic is like Tinder has come to life and is churning out different husbands with every swipe down of the ladder and I was SO here for it!

I had absolutely no idea where the story was taking me, but this kept me turning the pages and I was thoroughly entertained by the hilarious ride. An ideally timed read for me after the heavy dark thriller I had just finished, a perfect bit of fun escapism.

I laughed, cringed, actually laughed out load and had a couple of “WTAF” moments at some of the crazy decisions Lauren makes when she knows she can reset her world without fear of repercussion. No spoilers but the introduction of a slightly different husband was a brilliant addition!

Whilst it is, on the whole, light hearted, chucklesome and fast paced it also gets you thinking about how decisions we make can take us on a totally different path to what was expected, and I found myself wondering what I would do if I was in the same situation. I have checked my attic (although I call it a loft, anyone else??) though and sadly it seems to be severely lacking in its magical husband producing powers *sigh*!

It also got me thinking about the “grass is always greener” “thank you, next” type mentality that we can all be a little guilty of at times and how we are often looking for the next bigger, better, model rather than being happy and working with what we have.

My only teeny gripe is that the ending felt a little bit rushed for me. Although this didn’t impact my enjoyment of the read and I really liked how it wrapped things up nicely, even if a bit drastic and somewhat fiery (😉)

If we all had magic attics, would we trade in our slightly annoying partners for a new one? Probably 🤣

If you like a bit of magical-realism and a witty tale with heart then this one is for you and it is out now!

Thank you @netgalley @vintagebooks for the early access arc for this, I regret not starting it sooner!

A magical attic like no other!

Lauren comes home from a night out to find her husband in her house, a husband she didn't have when she went out!

What would you do if you could pick and choose partners as often as you like?

This book is heart-warming and funny. You literally don't know what's coming next and neither does our main character.
A great ending, you need to read this book :)

If you're looking for a book that's fun, innovative and thought-provoking, then look no further than The Husbands by Holly Gramazio! I had such a great time with this book, and I've genuinely never read a concept like it!

After a fun night out with her friend, Lauren returns back to her London apartment when she discovers her husband is settled inside. The catch?... Lauren isn't married! Or at least she didn't think she was? After some slight investigation, Lauren discovers that her apartment attic is somehow magically generating husbands - each one different and changing the course of her life through their existence. But how many husbands will Lauren discover until she finally finds 'the one'?

This entire concept was hugely entertaining and also hilarious! I personally struggle to find media genuinely funny, but this book had me chuckling throughout! Some of the husbands that came out of Lauren's attic were outrageous! I loved Holly's writing throughout this book - she managed to keep the entertainment value throughout, which initially I was concerned about, as for a 300+ page book, I did have concerns as to whether this plot line would quickly become repetitive and tedious. Alas, it was kept relevant and interesting throughout, and there were a couple of plot developments that had me truly hooked! Lauren has quite a complex personality and inner dialogue, and this made my opinions of her as the reader shift quite frequently - did I like her, did I not like her?? I was always kept on my toes.

For me, the ending was the only thing that may have let this book down slightly. Between all of the humour and entertainment value of this book, it has the reader thinking deeply about how we navigate life in the real world, always looking for the greener grass and hoping to find perfection in all avenues of life. Thus, I was hoping for a really satisfying ending to Lauren's story to conclude such a fun but poignant story. However, I did find it quite abrupt and wasn't overly convinced on my satisfaction upon finishing it. On paper, I feel as though the ending was good for Lauren and made sense for her story. But as the reader, and the ways in which we arrived at the ending, it felt slightly lacklustre.

Thank you so much to NetGalley for approving my eARC request with this book. I highly recommend this book!

One of my books of the year. What starts off as a light hearted, almost comedic premise turns into an intelligent and thought provoking look at relationships, coupledom and the human need to conform. The ending was a little too neat, which lost it a final star, but I will be highly recommending it.

A great story full of great humour and quirkiness. Imagine coming home to find a husband waiting for you that you don't remember meeting. Or said husband going into the attic and coming out a different man. How many husbands can you handle. Lots of fun.
I couldn't wait to turn the page

Y’all, I got way more than I expected with The Husbands - but in a good way. Romantic comedy? YES - but with a healthy bit of existentialism and introspection.

I’ve never believed in the idea of a single “THE ONE” - rather, I believe that each person might have ended up with a number of life partners, depending on their life choices, and that a happy partnered life has nothing to do with someone chosen by the cosmos.

…but then again, your attic might choose someone for you?

This improbable but hilarious scenario introduces Lauren to a myriad of husbands she might have chosen, in whatever slightly alternative life. It is a mind-bending inception kinda thing, because with each new husband comes slight variations: from decor, to her job, to her relationship with her family.

I love the way Gramazio can set up a scene, and I love how she writes Lauren’s states of mind: her listlessness at times, her lack of patience for the endless string of husbands. They way she thinks about the longing of the partnered-up for singledom, and vice versa.

The POV had me scratching my head a little. Certainly, for this “type” of book one would expect a first-person narrator - but the third person, stylistically, allows for that slightly deeper level of story without it feeling facetious.

Can a book be both cozy and contemplative? I think so - and The Husbands is the proof.

"The Husbands" by Holly Gramazio is a delightful rollercoaster of a debut novel that revels in the complexities of life, love, and choice. Lauren's surreal journey, encountering multiple husbands and alternate lives spawned by her attic, is both hilarious and thought-provoking. Gramazio crafts Lauren as the perfect protagonist for this whimsical tale, blending her carefree attitude with moments of depth and introspection. As readers follow Lauren's escapades, they're treated to a witty exploration of the infinite possibilities life offers and the challenges of making meaningful decisions.

The narrative seamlessly weaves humor with deeper themes, prompting reflection on the nature of contentment and the pursuit of perfection. Amidst the laughter, there's a poignant undercurrent as Lauren grapples with the loneliness of being the sole bearer of her memories. The novel's strength lies in its ability to balance whimsy with emotional resonance, drawing readers into Lauren's world and leaving them contemplating the value of embracing life's quirks.

At its heart, "The Husbands" is a celebration of life's unpredictability and the beauty of embracing the unknown. With its engaging characters, witty dialogue, and thoughtful exploration of existential questions, this book is a must-read for anyone seeking a captivating literary escape. Highly recommended for those who enjoy a dose of cheeky humor and a dash of existential pondering.

I really liked the idea this book is based around. A woman comes home one evening and her husband greets her except she doesn’t actually have a husband, he goes up to the attic and another husband comes down and so begins a stream of husbands. An original and funny idea but maybe I liked the idea more than the actual book. After the first third of the book ( which I enjoyed) I had no clue where this book was going and then it took a while to eventually get there.

Overall it’s a fun read but it could have been a great one. I did enjoy the authors writing and would absolutely read more from her.

This is a difficult book for me to review, mainly because for the most part I really struggled to enjoy it.
You jump headfirst into the story right from the first sentence and usually I find this a good thing. However in this I felt like I had no clue who the characters were or what was actually happening. This lack of connection and investment unfortunately carried on throughout. Not helped by the fact that this is written in third person, which I find really distances me from the characters. It felt almost like I was watching the story from above rather than feeling connected to it.
The magical realism element took me a good 30% of the book to wrap my head around.
The main character of Lauren I didn't care about so ultimately didn't care about what would happen.
There was such an opportunity here for some humour but this lacked any. There wasn't even a little bit.
BUT.
After the 30% mark something clicked for me and I started to tune into the writing style and plot and I did get more interested in it. The more I read the more it started to win me over.
BUT.
Then my interest seemed to drop off again. This was because it was all starting to feel a bit repetitive and felt to be dragging. I feel like this story was longer than it should have been and could easily have been told a lot quicker.
So, this was a weird one for me. Parts I liked, but unfortunately this was mostly a miss for me.
If you enjoy magical realism (something I admit, I haven't read a lot of) mixed with women's fiction, this might be one for you.

A revolving door of husbands, without ever leaving home or having to go through the trauma of planning a wedding. Sounds ideal, right?
When I first read the synopsis of The Husbands, I was intrigued: how would the author execute this daring conceit?
For the books intents, the husbands would all be real people. And how can relationships between real people not get messy and complicated?
I was so excited to read this book!

“Sooner or later, somebody has to want something, and then admit to it.”

That’s the thing about “settling down”: once you’ve decided you want to do it, you have to make a wholehearted effort.
For Lauren, who is fast becoming The Last Single One in her circle of friends and family, that push to settle down comes in the form of a magical attic that offers her husband after husband, showing her all the possible lives she could lead.
One of the main things that stood out to me about Lauren is how she wants to be settled, but does not have a grasp on the meaning of commitment. After she comes to terms with the fact that the dark upper room of her house is a portal into the hundreds of relationships she could live in, Lauren takes the opportunity to answer the question, “what if?”

What if she is the kind of woman who can marry an incredibly kind but otherwise boring man? What if she had married that one terrible ex-boyfriend? Is there such a thing as a husband who is too perfect, with his handsome face/ helpful attitude/ endless riches?

The attic seems to be supplying men at random, sending a new one down just as soon as the last one’s foot disappears off the last rung of the ladder. I believe it is giving Lauren all the men she thinks she would want, letting her live her life with them, showing her how each relationship would change her – sometimes making her a worse version of herself – and forcing her to commit.

Lauren is caught up in the malaise of dating that settles over the life of any woman who has been trying to lock down a partner with little to no success.
She’s happy for her friends in a sincere if obligatory way: they’ve found their partners. She will find hers. Right? Because that’s what she wants? That’s the right thing to do?

As Lauren learns to be okay with men coming in and out of her life on a magical whim, she still has to deal with all her own insecurities. Who is she? Who is she in a relationship? Is she fulfilled, generally?
The author takes us through these thoughts in Lauren’s mind, inviting us to also answer the questions for ourselves.

Though Lauren does not make any big gestures towards the end, for most of the part I had the impression that she didn’t really know what love was. She was familiar with the idea of safety and comfort in a relationship, but it was only when she met a starry-eyed, open-hearted American potential husband that she started to display any signs of being in love. And, later, the signs of being obsessed, or desperate to bring back the one that got away. The Carter episodes were my favourite.

After a fiasco with a husband that included drugs, lies and an air rifle, Lauren is shaken to her core. She decides that the next husband – whatever quirks he may have, whatever flaws his behaviour might highlight in herself – is the one she will keep.

Because while endless swiping might occupy your time and maybe provide a thrill every now and then, it’s no way to live a life.

In texts where there is one person who is travelling through time or otherwise exploring parallel realities, an interesting thing for me is to see how that experience affects everyone else in the character’s world. If you tell them you’re from the future, does that change their present? Whenever you jump universes, does everyone else feel it too, or is it just a normal Tuesday for them?
In this book, there was not much focus on the mechanics; it was more about thinking through the events and consequences. Which is okay, because many things are often ruined by focusing too much on “details”.
That said, I thought it was creative of the author to introduce Bohai, a fellow “traveller” into Lauren’s story. Every main character needs a confidant, and while Bohai was a bit of a wild card, he did show Lauren a way forward.


In the end, Lauren cuts off her possibilities in a very dramatic way. There is a lot of really interesting build-up that reminded me of those early 2000s movies where someone was always having to defuse a bomb. But then the story ended not with a bang, but with a puff.
I suppose I would have liked for Lauren to spend more time really reckoning with the way the experience with the husbands changed her, what it did to her definitions of love and of commitment.
But she also could have just resigned herself to an endless carousel of husbands, learning nothing and never being fulfilled. So I guess that’s the lesson.

Overall The Husbands is a well-written novel with a twist on an idea that we are all always thinking about.