When Queenie’s long-time boyfriend Tom calls for a separation, Queenie doesn’t know what to do with herself. She tries to throw herself into her work, but she’s not feeling it; she then tries to throw herself into meaningless relationships with men she meets online, but that only causes her to spiral further down the rabbit hole of desperation. Pretty soon she hits rock bottom, but the good thing about that is there’s only up to go from there. With the help of her friends and her family, she begins to figure out who the real Queenie is and starts to figure out the person she wants to be. This novel was heavy and dealt with a lot of family trauma and overcoming bad habits, anxiety and self-loathing, while also learning to let go of things and move on. It was truly a rollercoaster of a read; the first half really made the reader question if they even liked what they were reading, but the second half really redeemed itself. We started off with our main character, Queenie on the destruction path to her life and it was hard to watch it all happen. But as we moved through the story, the redeeming arc of her knowing she needed help and seeking it despite family who were against it, made it all worth it. The plot was done in a way where it wasn’t too fast that things were thrown at the reader, but it wasn’t too slow either where we felt we were stuck in her perpetual cycle of doom. It was a good balance of both and Carty-Williams did a good job of creating a space for both versions of Queenie to live. That being said, Queenie wasn’t a bad character, she just kept making bad decisions that would frustrate the reader. In fact, Queenie was such a flawed and unpredictable character which made her really interesting to read and to wonder what would happen to her next. It propelled the reader to keep going because they figured something good had to happen to her. She really captivated them in her boldness and the way she came across; she was definitely memorable. Even the secondary characters were memorable in the ways they were there for Queenie; they all had a different way of showing their affection. It showed the good relationships in her life and how strong and powerful they were. The reader really liked that, as much as Queenie felt she needed a man or sex, she started to figure out who she was without those things and it was refreshing to read. Carty-Williams created such complex dynamics for all the characters that left reading this so hard to put down; whether you were rooting for them or disliking them, their intricacies were so well developed it was hard to feel just one sort of way about them. In the end, this was a novel that packed a punch, that was written really well with really good characters.