Really Good, Actually: The must-read major Sunday Times bestselling debut novel of 2023

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I had high hopes for this Canadian writer and comedian, a writer for the show Schitt’s Creek which I LOVE! With that, another #tandemreadalongis done and dusted. This time, the group ventured into the rapidly falling apart world of Maggie. She finds herself in her late 20s, staring down the barrel of divorce. We follow her throughout the year of her separation, between split and divorce papers.

There were a few stand out, hilarious lines (Harry Styles anyone?), but overall this book wasn’t really for me. It’s probably just my preference for a plot driven story rather than a character driven one. If you’re into what some people in the group chat called ‘sad girl fiction’, or a character development driven story, this one would be up your alley!"The toaster line is typical of Heisey’s style: mostly ridiculous, yet with an emotional core that appeals to the heart. And Heisey knows how Maggie is feeling. The London-based Canadian author, who has worked as a screenwriter on the sitcom Schitt’s Creek, was herself married at 26 and divorced at 28. Here the immensely recognisable experience of heartbreak is heightened to a painful degree: how does someone who once seemed to have a relationship so perfect she made it legal, reappear into the world now she is divorced – and still in her twenties? Her first book, I Can't Believe It's Not Better, a collection of essays, short stories, and—in an unlikely twist—poems, was published in 2015, and was a Globe & Mail, National Post, and CBC “Best Book of the Year.” This was also the year of her first television job, as a member of the writing room for the sketch comedy series Baroness von Sketch Show (CBC/IFC). She worked on all five seasons of Baroness, and, with the rest of the writing room, was awarded four Canadian Screen Awards for comedy writing. And we also hear about the hotly anticipated book coming next month in our Editors' Tip from Dialogue's Hannah Chukwu

The spirited, often sarcastic tone with which Heisey describes these events is heavily indebted to social media: “Then I went to a hypnotist who told me to imagine being beautiful in a bathing suit and I was cured, just kidding.”

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stars: 2 stars for the book itself, but a million stars for goddess Julia Whelan's narration of the audiobook, so I'm rounding up. The whole thing is a bit of a ramble, really. We’re with Maggie and she’s spiralling and then not spiralling and then spiralling some more. It’s fun and relatable in a chaotic sort of way which is realistic if you think about it. There’s plenty introspection and the kind of deep thought that happens when your life is collapsing. Plenty drama. It would make for light (?) reading. At least to me, it was light ish. I recommend. Maggie is a 29 year old struggling to come to terms with a fresh divorce and for some reason has zero self restraint. She is endlessly cringey; constantly acting poorly and saying awful things to her friends. I’m surprised her friends didn’t fall out with her sooner.

First of all, the positives as I see them. The premise is a creative one and I do enjoy the new chaotic life Maggie now lives though the standout feature that appeals to me the most is the ironic, sarcastic tone and the social commentary. The friendships are good and there are some scenes that are entertaining as Maggie employs a multitude of diversionary tactics. The Google searches she does a funny too! The action is interrupted by chapter breaks with titles such as “Selected Correspondence, Tinder, August 20” and “Well-Meaning Conversations With Loved Ones, Truncated at the Exact Moment They Start to Bring Up Kintsugi”. These lists, which read like parodies of themselves (one involves a “fantasy” in which Maggie is dating Harry Styles), break the narrative tension that ­Heisey otherwise sculpts carefully. Here's a list of alternate titles that went through my head while I was listening to Really Good, Actually: This kind of book doesn’t usually make it on my top 10s of the year lists. If it didn’t terrify me, make me cry or make me gag because I was so disturbed, then it probably wasn’t for me. I like a book that gives me a literal physical reaction. But this book made me laugh so much and made me so happy??? That never happens! So it might just end up in my top 10 🥰🫶🏽Maggie’s marriage is ending only six hundred and eight days after it began (despite being together nearly a decade) . . . Maggie’s marriage has ended just 608 days after it started, but she’s fine – she’s doing really good, actually. Sure, she’s alone for the first time in her life, can’t afford her rent and her obscure PhD is going nowhere . . . but at the age of twenty-nine, Maggie is determined to embrace her new status as a Surprisingly Young Divorcée™. The reader gets inside the chaotic and often contradictory thoughts swimming inside Maggie’s head, which anyone who has gone through a heartbreak will relate to Maggie’s self-destructive behaviour and the way she questions her life choices, in this case marrying in her 20s, and if she is worth loving. The short extracts of text messages, notes, fantasy scenarios, google searches and other forms of writing that illustrate Maggie’s internal dialogue (that are included at the end of most chapters) were hilarious to read and painfully relatable. You know how every funny book about a single woman who is a ‘bit of mess’ is compared to Bridget Jones? Well, comparatively? Bridget: step aside babes. Maggie is fine. She’s doing really good, actually. Sure, she’s broke, her graduate thesis on something obscure is going nowhere, and her marriage only lasted 608 days, but at the ripe old age of twenty-nine, Maggie is determined to embrace her new life as a Surprisingly Young Divorcée™.