B+
Genre: Women's Fiction
I picked up The No-Show because based on the blurb, I thought this would be some sort of feminist revenge fantasy. Said blurb:
Three women who seemingly have nothing in common find that they’re involved with the same man in this smart new rom-com by Beth O’Leary, bestselling author of The Flatshare.
Sadly this does not end in a sisterhood pact over this man’s grave.
Despite my wrong assumptions, I hoovered up this book in less than a day, sighing happily at 4 a.m. once I reached the HEA. Because yes, there’s a happy ending for most of the women dating Joseph Carter.
The No-Show starts with Siobhan, Miranda, and Jane being stood up on Valentine’s Day for breakfast, lunch, or dinner respectively. The three women are angry, worried, or unsurprised to be stood up, depending on their personal level of self-esteem and patience. When their boyfriend/fuckbuddy/date shows up the next day, frazzled and contrite, he manages to convince them to forgive him by spitting out a variety of excuses. But lingering questions remain for each of them, and the missed Valentine’s Day plants the seeds for a shift in Joseph’s relationships.
I would describe The No Show as a romantic whodunit. It’s a romance that feels like a mystery, where the puzzle is figuring out what the fuck is going on with all these relationships. The book sprinkles clues and misdirections as we piece together how each of the women met Joseph and how he’s managing this audacious juggling act. Joseph’s lovers are smart women, and they’re skeptical. As Joseph’s lies pile up, I kept wondering how and when he’d be found out. There’s some unexpected twists that I didn’t see coming that make all the threads feel satisfying in the end.
It’s difficult to describe the plot of this book without spoiling it. The story is told from the POV of the three women, so we only see Joseph through their perspective. Siobhan is an ambitious career coach in Dublin, who looks forward to monthly sex dates with Joseph and his magic tongue. She tries to remain guarded, but Joseph’s attentiveness gets under her skin.
Miranda is a badass tree surgeon in London, happiest when climbing a tree, and most annoyed while fending off compliments from her hot lumberjack coworker. She’s mildly amazed to have landed a steady boyfriend like Joseph, but knows he’s keeping secrets. Meanwhile, Jane is a fragile young woman with a mysterious past trauma who’s starting over in Winchester. She starts a book club with Joseph, and slowly develops a crush, but she’s not sure if he sees her as more than a friend.
I found myself frequently giggling at this book, and underlining my favorite phrases. There’s plenty of zingy dialogue and pithy noticings about social dynamics. Siobhan in particular is entertainingly self aware.
“…there’s a half-drunk double-shot oat-milk latte on the table in front of her. If she’d known she was going to be stood up on Valentine’s Day, she’d have got proper milk. Siobhan is only vegan when she’s in a good mood.”
O’Leary writes about women who are healing from abuse, both work and personal, exceptionally well. Each of the women resonated with me in how they exhibited a different common dynamic of the past couple of years—Siobhan’s overwork causes her to burnout, Jane is rebuilding her sense of self after a toxic work situation, and Miranda is learning to trust her strength and beauty, because she isn’t sure if she’s posh enough for Joseph. In each case, the women’s relationships with Joseph help them grow and heal, even if they don’t end up with him at the end. It might have been the mystery of how Joseph was going to get caught that kept me reading, but it was spending time with Siobhan, Miranda and Jane’s journey that made me enjoy the book along the way.
At first, I didn’t want to like Joseph because he felt like a combination of the leads from Sister Wives and Dexter, a charmingly manipulative man with his own moral code. As readers, we slowly unpeel the ways his life intersects with the three very different women. And the more I learned about Joseph, the more he wormed his way into my heart just like the heroines. Joseph works in IT in London, but spends most of his time in his hometown of Winchester. He’s a lovable nerd, who just happens to be drop-dead gorgeous, and takes care of his mom with dementia even though she can’t help calling his girlfriend by the wrong name.
I was fascinated by the way Joseph genuinely seems like the perfect boyfriend for each of these women. He remembers a favorite brand of massage oil, and the way one likes her pancakes. He checks out the perfect book from the library, and pitches in to help Miranda trim a tree. He loves their imperfections, and reminds them of their talents. He’s a chameleon who fits into their lives neatly, trying to give them exactly what they want. Initially, he doesn’t appear to have an agenda beyond taking care of the women in his life. Still himself, more at home in a suit than a hoodie, but just a little more the version you need him to be. It seemed exhausting, which is part of what makes him sympathetic. I felt compelled to keep reading in order to piece together why Joseph was dating each of them.
Like Joseph, The No-Show has a tendency to spread itself too thin. There are quite a few characters across three cities, and I didn’t feel like I got to sink into their lives completely. Someone would reference a family drama, but we wouldn’t see them resolve it. Another character would introduce her closest friends, and then we’d never see them again, only hearing about a tragic event around them mentioned in passing. Miranda, Siobhan and Jane’s family and colleagues were comical and opinionated, but with four main characters to keep up with, the others faded into the background. I would have loved to spend more time with Jane’s 70-something gay friends, who were figuring out how to come out to their one living parent, and Miranda’s snarky twin sisters/roommates felt like they needed their own book. This shallowness is particularly frustrating for one of the women’s love interests, who spends too much time being annoying. That character failed to recalibrate fast enough for me to find their HEA satisfying. As a romance fan, I was also disappointed that Joseph didn’t do more groveling at the end. My grovel-o-meter wasn’t quite satisfied, despite his obvious pain.
I do want to add a spoiler so readers go into this book fully aware of one key point. This information is going behind spoiler tags so please note it is a Major Spoiler, but I’m keeping the specifics somewhat vague.
Without giving away the major twist of the book and ruining the whole reader experience, I think it’s important that readers know that only 2 of the 3 women get a romance HEA.
EVEN BIGGER SPOILER HERE WITH SPECIFICS – highlight to read!
One of the MC dies, and the reader is in her POV when it happens. It’s not explicit or gory, but it was shocking, and I want to warn readers who would find this part upsetting.
I Ioved how The No-Show kept me guessing. The story sucked me in with its complicated layers and kept me wondering whether one woman needed Joseph in her life a bit more than the rest. The No-Show may appeal to readers who like relationship-driven fiction with laughs, angst, tension, and tragedy. I gave up mysteries during the pandemic, but the book reminded me of how fun they can be. Just be prepared to join the Bad Decisions Book Club.
This book is available from:
As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.
We also may use affiliate links in our posts, as well.
Thanks!
The set-up for this sounds like “The Other Woman” with Cameron Diaz, Leslie Mann, Kate Upton and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau. The book kind of intrigues me but I have decided not to pick it up. I can barely tolerate love triangles (love squares?) as is, though I suspect there might be multiple timelines in this. Also if I’d read that major spoiler part I would probably throw the book across the room and never even look at it again. Still I kind of want to look up an extremely spoilery review to know what’s actually happening. Oh well.
@Lynn, if you want a spoilery review, head over to Amazon. I stopped reading their mystery book reviews years ago because so many had total plot spoilers casually tossed in.
Another cartoony cover that (based on the review and the spoilers) is absolutely wrong for the tone of the book.
@Lynn: I feel the same way, so I actually googled the title, author and “spoiler”. It did not yield every last detail, but some questions are resolved.I still don’t want to read the book.
Amazon is selling this as a romance. In fact, it’s one of 10 Editors’ Picks for Best Romance. I really feel that the marketing for this book is false advertising. If you look at the major reviews included with the description (Kirkus, etc.), they lead you to believe this is a feel-good rom-com.
FYI, highlighting to see the major spoiler doesn’t work for me. I did get spoilers from the review at Ellie Reads Fiction.
@MaryK: highlighting didn’t work on my iPhone. It did work using my laptop.
I ranked this one a flat B. Had a lot of problems with the narrative, I really never warmed to Joseph and his emotionally manipulative ass. O’Leary had a lot going on here, and it’s my least favorite of her books
I think both the cover and the descriptive copy are working deliberately to set up reader expectations for something this book doesn’t turn out to be. That is, I think they’re designed to create misdirection. I haven’t read the book, so I won’t comment on whether I think it was a good choice, but I have managed to thoroughly spoil myself on it and…
Also Lord and Butter is this not a romcom. It has funny moments, but it’s mainly a slice of women’s fiction with some thriller elements and extremely triggering subject matter (Sibohan’s self-harm is VERY realistic and got close to triggering for me, but that was a personal thing).
Wow that’s a hell of a thing in the major spoiler highlight. O.O I’ve only ever read two books in which that happened; in one of them it was an inevitable thing, the whole book was about that, so getting to that point wasn’t a shock. In the other it was a dream sequence.
This book sounds … interesting? But not fun. I have a feeling I would read it and think I’d rather have read the same basic concept from the guy’s singular point of view. Maybe I have limited patience with storylines about women coping with men/the shit men do.
I couldn’t get the spoiler to show up on my phone either, but I think I’ll skip the book. I loved the flat share and have DNF’d her other books since then. I think her books are not for me.
Thanks for the warning about this book. If you’re like me, and can’t handle unexpected or tragic events, even when reading, right now, then there’s a really sweet and extremely spoiler-y review at emandherbooks dot com. I might read this book some day, as I really liked The Flatshare, but going to pass for now.
I finished this last night and have mixed feelings about this book. For the record I DNF The Flatshare and thoroughly enjoyed The Switch. I haven’t read her other book. I felt that this book really suffered from poor editing. The characters all felt really flat. Siobhan in particular was just glossed over. Her past relationship was only mentioned twice despite it being a major plot device. The other two female characters were interesting but again, never really fleshed out. Joseph was just a conduit to explore these women’s flaws and growth. It didn’t quite work. Joseph himself was frankly kind of boring. Like the women, I never felt that I knew him or his motivations.
Keeping all the above in mind I did enjoy the book on some level. I enjoyed how the narrative was driven forward and liked how things were resolved (kind of?) It is really hard to describe the book without giving a lot away. I will say it is definitely not a Rom-Com more Women’s Lit. The cover is completely out of touch with the actual story. I didn’t feel like there was a big reveal or plot twist. There was definite foreshadowing that dropped hints. I guess it just comes down to these characters didn’t elicit strong emotions from me. The readers guide in the back helped bring out some good points. Curious how it will be received by others.
I’ve read all of O’Leary’s books so far and this is my favorite since The Flatshare. I agree with alot of people that this doesn’t fit the structure (or really the tone) of a Romance novel, but O’Leary has always skirted the edge of that definition IMO.
I really enjoyed this novel. I liked the structure especially after I found out about the “twist” at the end. I think viewing it as a typical romance or even a mystery is setting up the wrong expectations. For me, this was a novel about how personal history and relationships are carried with you throughout your life and how they effect not only past but future relationship choices. It’s about how you have to deal with your history in order to get to your personal HEA. In this, it feels consistent with O’Leary’s other books (especially The Flatshare and The Switch.
Just finished this. I have all kinds of conflicting feelings. Is it well-written? Yep. Is the “twist” a good one? Yep. Was I uncomfortable reading the first 70%? Absolutely. I was so pissed at Joseph and lived in constant fear of how Jane would react when she found out about the other 2 women and then bam! The twist and the spoiler come out at you, and can I just ask who the hell decided to market this as a rom-con???? It is in no way a rom-con. I loved the Flatshare and The Switch but loathed The Road Trip with every fiber of my being. I don’t know what to think of this one. I’m not usually given to big emotions about books but this one has left me angry.
I agree with all of the reviewers who’ve said this book is mis-marketed as a rom-com. It is not a rom-com at all. I probably would not have read it if I had peeked at the spoilers beforehand. It was well-written but not my cup of tea. I read romance to escape, not to be reminded of all the ways men can be terrible and life can suck.