The Wife App by Carolyn Mackler
Published: June 27, 2023
Simon & Schuster
Pages: 367
Genre: Women’s Fiction
KKECReads Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
I received a copy of this book for free, and I leave my review voluntarily.
Carolyn Mackler is the author of the popular teen novels, The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things (A Michael L. Printz Honor Book), Infinite in Between, Tangled, Guyaholic, Vegan Virgin Valentine, and Love and Other Four-Letter Words. Carolyn’s novels have been published in more than twenty countries, including the United Kingdom, Australia, Germany, France, Italy, Korea, the Netherlands, Denmark, Israel, and Indonesia.Carolyn lives in New York City with her husband and two sons.
Lauren, mother of twins, wakes up one morning to her Wife Alarm Bells sounding. She sleuths on her husband’s phone and stumbles on a dirty secret that explodes her marriage. Madeline has it all—a penthouse apartment, a perfect daughter, and no-strings-attached romps with handsome men. When she learns that she might lose her child to her ex in England, it stirs up a decades-old personal tragedy. Sophie, with too much FOMO and never enough money, obsesses over her ex-husband’s Family 2.0—all while keeping her true desires hidden, even from herself.
It starts as a joke during a tipsy night out, as Lauren, Madeline, and Sophie rail against everything wives do for free. Let’s build an app that monetizes the mental load. And maybe get revenge on our exes in the process? Soon, the Wife App is born, and before long, it’s the fastest growing start-up in New York City. But then life intervenes. Love intervenes. Ex-husbands intervene. And the consequences are bigger than anything Lauren, Madeline, or Sophie could have expected. Carolyn Mackler marks her debut into adult fiction with a hilarious rollercoaster ride of revenge and redemption that is at once a send-up of modern marriage and a celebration of female friendship and love in all forms.
“Who the hell knows if anything will ever be fine?”
Lauren is a devoted mom to her twin daughters, and she tries to be a good wife. But lately, things have felt different with her husband. Sophie is a busy single mom, trying to get everything done while trying to be okay with hiding a big piece of who she is. Madeline is trying to figure out what she wants to do. She has different worries than most, but money can’t buy happiness.
This was very cute. I loved the women supporting women aspect. And how open, accepting, and genuine these characters were. The idea of this kind of app is both fascinating and weird.
I liked our three main characters. They were all different, but their similarities were what made them great. I love that they each had to overcome something within themselves to grow and unleash their inner strength and peace.
This was an easy read with a nice pace. The topics covered were relevant, and the mix of humor was great.