Reviews with content warning for Grief - The Ex Talk

Reviews tagging 'Grief'

The Ex Talk by Rachel Lynn Solomon

112 reviews

chemistryreads's review against another edition

funny hopeful lighthearted medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.25

Shay is a classic nearly-30-year-old who wants love but isn’t sure where to find it. She’s been working at the same radio station for nearly a decade, loves her job, but feels a little lonely when she goes home. Cue Dominic Yun and his shiny masters degree getting a job at Shay’s radio station and quickly becoming the best new thing. The tension is thick between the two of them and when they have the option of being let go or starting off a new show pretending to be exes, well, do they really have a choice? Throughout the entire novel, Shay and Dominic’s banter is spot-on and a joy to listen to. Their chemistry is palpable and is built in a brilliant manner by the author. They both bring their baggage along with them, Shay’s being a little heavier, and learn to grow as people, but also as partners. The timing and plot of this book was really well done; I wished the ending was a bit different or had more of a lead-up, but I still enjoyed it. The banter was really the highlight and the audiobook made it that much more fun. This is my second read of this book and I think I love it even more now! 4.25⭐️, 2🌶

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garbage_mcsmutly's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

This was a highly enjoyable listen! I will say that I am predisposed to like stories involving radio or podcasts or narration, so this was kinda made for me already.

📝 I really liked this story. The FMC, whose POV the story is told from, is an interesting character with some unresolved issues, particularly around the loss of her father a decade ago. And she has baggage from past relationships that leads her to make less than stellar choices with MMC. MMC has his own issues too, and he is younger and less experienced than FMC in terms of relationships/sex.

The MCs start a radio show that is hosted by two exes (them). The only thing is, they never actually dated. But the show gets really popular and well, obviously stuff happens with that.

🎧 This was first person POV, only from the FMC. The female narrator did an amazing job with the content and the story itself was engaging. I think she had to walk a fine line, because it is a fact in the book that the FMC has a "girly" and often "grating" voice, but you don't want to actually alienate the listeners for the book, so she had to perform something feminine, that is close to, but not actually, grating. I thought her voice was incredibly pleasant but I don't have internalized misogyny about feminine sounding voices so ymmv.

🌶️ 3.5/5 there were a few explicit sex scenes (btw the narrator executed these scenes to perfection).

🏳️‍🌈✊ There was a lot of diversity represented in the story. Asian MMC and white Jewish FMC. Multiple queer and ethnically diverse side characters. An African American (the patriarch is from Nigeria) family joining into FMC's.

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bzliz's review against another edition

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lighthearted medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.5

I didn’t have high hopes for this which is probably for the best because it was just okay. I enjoyed it enough to finish it but it wasn’t anything special.

I think the author tried to include some more serious subjects that people face in life like sexism, racism, loss and grief, but none of them went in depth enough to feel genuine. The closest was the sexist boss at the radio station getting minorly told off for his awful behavior but it was mostly handled through conversations about him between female characters which means nothing really came of it. There was also some mention of the struggle of interracial dating but it was brief and the main characters didn’t have to deal with any of it.

Shay and Dominic were fine characters but they were hampered by a downright obsession with public radio. There were a couple of romance tropes used to varying degrees of success. The rivals to lovers aspect was fun vs the ‘just one bed’ trope which was super predictable from the moment they were being sent on a trip. And Shay mentioned being pushed up against the wall roughly a dozen times which got old quick.

If you read purely for vibes, this is worth checking out. If you’re looking for something with more heart, you can skip this.

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blackveilbeccy's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful lighthearted medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

I was a little slow to get into this one, but about a third of the way in it just clicked with me. I adored the MMC and I felt the relationship was super cute in the end. Both the FMC and MMC were relatable in different ways and their relationship development felt natural. Most of the side characters were well developed. The workplace dynamics and the rivals to lovers trope were both done well. Despite a lot of the heavy topics discussed in the plot, this still managed to retain a little fluffiness, a little lightheartedness and humour.

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bookishspy's review against another edition

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challenging emotional lighthearted slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

The Ex Talk was a solid read but was missing something for me.

Shay was pretty interesting, and I was pretty pleased that I didn't hate an FMC for once. She had a personality, and she adopted a cute AF dog, Steve Rogers! I've got to say, being a dog trainer myself, the little bits of dog training "advice" did kind of make me want to stop reading, but otherwise, that was super cute.

Dominic felt a little flat for me most of the time. There were moments when his personality peeked out, and I LOVED it, but he just felt very one dimensional otherwise. Perhaps this was because the story was only told from Shay's perspective? I wanted to know what was on Dominics' mind.

Their romance was totally believable, though. It was gradual and slow and felt really natural. I wanted more honestly it was so good!

The side characters were all fantastic. I also love the diversity in this book and that real-life issues like sexism and racism were brought into the story.

The pacing at the end did feel a little weird. I didn't quite feel satisfied like I'd hoped. I think because we were hit so hard, and then we got barely any time to recover.

Overall, this was a good read that I could recommend to most people, but it was just missing that satisfying finale and the wow factor that makes me go for that extra star

➛ 𝟒 𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐬

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sagireadinglist's review against another edition

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funny lighthearted relaxing medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

The basics:
-an (brief) enemies-to-lovers story
-an age-gap romance (older woman with a younger man)
-two people having to pretend to be exes as they host a podcast about relationships
-smut? yes

Even though I don't always gravitate toward enemies-to-lovers stories, the premise was interesting enough that I became curious. I like the behind-the-scenes look at public radio and podcasting, but would have liked having more of the podcast transcripts throughout the book (they ended up being more fun to read than I expected) and see how Shay and Dominic warmed up to each other on the show.

Now, onto the couple. The banter was there. Nothing particularly ground-breaking or life-changing, but it was nice to see how their interactions developed. However, I do find the mentions of Dominic's height too excessive and I could only stand so much description about how he's so tall and towering (yes, I get that he's 6"3, can we move on now?). I did like reading about how Shay is still processing the death of her father and how it's still affecting her to this day, and some of her words about the topic really resonated with me, but I can't get rid of the sense that she doesn't really read like a woman in her 30s. Maybe it's the way she acts? A little too aware that she's "millennial trash"? But then again, I'm not in my 30s so I can't comment too much on this.

I did end up liking Dominic quite a bit. He's very endearing, and I ended up relating to him because he and I share the same views when it comes to dating and sex. To be warned, their conflict is mostly centered around communication problems, and even the inevitable unraveling of their show did not get a satisfying conclusion.

Other than that, this was a fun and light read that suddenly made me want to go back to listening to podcasts.

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vj_thompson's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful lighthearted sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

This book started out slow but once the initial plot of Shay and Dominic host the radio show together happened, it got good. Seeing their relationship develop was absolutely adorable. The relationship felt normal aside from the miscommunication. Ugh, that sucked. The story surprised me. I didn’t think I would like it as much as I did.

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