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Ghost Lover: Stories
“Raw and searching...Taddeo returns with more ruthless explorations of the feminine mystique.” —Entertainment Weekly, “The Best New Books of the Month” * “Provocative.” —Los Angeles Times
From the #1 New York Times bestselling and award-winning author of Three Women and “our most eloquent and faithful chronicler of human desire” (Esquire), comes an electrifying collection of nine fearless and ferocious short stories.
Behind anonymous screens, an army of cool and beautiful girls manage the dating service Ghost Lover, a forwarding system for text messages that promises to spare you the anguish of trying to stay composed while communicating with your crush. At a star-studded political fundraiser in a Los Angeles mansion, a trio of women compete to win the heart of the slick guest of honor. In a tense hospital waiting room, an inseparable pair of hard-partying friends crash into life’s responsibilities, but the magic of their glory days comes alive again at the moment they least expect it.
In these nine riveting stories—which include two Pushcart Prize winners and a finalist for the National Magazine Award—Lisa Taddeo brings to life the fever of obsession, the blindness of love, and the mania of grief. Featuring Taddeo’s arresting prose that continues to thrill her legions of fans, Ghost Lover dares you to look away.
From the #1 New York Times bestselling and award-winning author of Three Women and “our most eloquent and faithful chronicler of human desire” (Esquire), comes an electrifying collection of nine fearless and ferocious short stories.
Behind anonymous screens, an army of cool and beautiful girls manage the dating service Ghost Lover, a forwarding system for text messages that promises to spare you the anguish of trying to stay composed while communicating with your crush. At a star-studded political fundraiser in a Los Angeles mansion, a trio of women compete to win the heart of the slick guest of honor. In a tense hospital waiting room, an inseparable pair of hard-partying friends crash into life’s responsibilities, but the magic of their glory days comes alive again at the moment they least expect it.
In these nine riveting stories—which include two Pushcart Prize winners and a finalist for the National Magazine Award—Lisa Taddeo brings to life the fever of obsession, the blindness of love, and the mania of grief. Featuring Taddeo’s arresting prose that continues to thrill her legions of fans, Ghost Lover dares you to look away.
240 pages, Paperback
First published June 14, 2022
467 people are currently reading
22110 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 997 reviews
May 1, 2024
I LOVE GHOSTS!!!!!!
this didn't pack the same punch that taddeo's other books have for me, and i didn't have the energy to do reviews for each story in this collection (and honestly i don't think either of us are missing much for it), but it did feel like a book i could revisit at a time when not many do!
and that's enough!
although not enough for me to be able to answer whether i should round this 3.5 rating up or down.
bottom line: too many uses of the word enough...but this is good enough at what it wants to be.
this didn't pack the same punch that taddeo's other books have for me, and i didn't have the energy to do reviews for each story in this collection (and honestly i don't think either of us are missing much for it), but it did feel like a book i could revisit at a time when not many do!
and that's enough!
although not enough for me to be able to answer whether i should round this 3.5 rating up or down.
bottom line: too many uses of the word enough...but this is good enough at what it wants to be.
May 22, 2022
I saw this collection of 9 short stories by Lisa Taddeo as an opportunity to become acquainted with her work which I know many readers have loved. Did I like all the stories? The honest answer is no, not all of them appealed, but I did appreciate her distinctive writing style, the vibrant and well written prose, which was a particular highlight for me. It focuses on women, through time, flawed, with their competitive rivalries and judgements, insecurities, loves, losses, friendships, traumas, abuse, the madness of grief and obsessions. There is a shocking raw brutality present that left this reader feeling markedly unsettled and disturbed at times. Set in a number of different locations, featuring a wide ranging cast of mostly well constructed characters, it examines women and their feelings, their pain, complicated emotions, on beauty, identity, the process of ageing and its impact on the female body, sexuality, sex, desire, relationships, and the repercussions of poor decisionmaking.
My personal favourites were Grace Magorian, Air Supply and Ghost Lover. Definitely a memorable and impactful collection of short stories, and be prepared to find many of the women unlikeable. Many thanks to the publisher for an ARC.
My personal favourites were Grace Magorian, Air Supply and Ghost Lover. Definitely a memorable and impactful collection of short stories, and be prepared to find many of the women unlikeable. Many thanks to the publisher for an ARC.
May 22, 2022
This was a SLOOOG to get through. I think it’s time to declare that Lisa Taddeo is 200% not for me. There is some great cutting prose here - but it’s buried within such casual fatphobia and a panache for writing women who inevitably loathe other women. It’s grating, and unpleasant to read and I will never understand the love for her books. In the boon of “female rage” hitting the market these days, there is just so much better out there!
June 20, 2022
I love an unlikeable protagonist, but nine variations of marginally suicidal, lonely, weight-obsessed, probably white woman who is pining after a man who is either wholly uninterested or pays attention to her only peripherally? Not for me. Taddeo can write, certainly, but wow did I dislike each and every one of these stories.
June 16, 2022
Audiobook…read by a full cast ….
….6 hours and 56 minutes
I drifted occasionally listening to Lisa’s new book.
I like Lisa Taddeo—but either I wasn’t much in the mood for these 9-listening-stories or other distractions were pulling at me.
Mostly -
- I thought these stories were pretty good in the depressing way life can present itself.
And -
- I took note to appreciate my ‘much-less-drama-free-life.
Beautiful women had bountiful problems….
Me:
….I’ve never been tall ….
or blond. So nothing to worry about that.
….I never took heroin.
….I never tried to steal another woman’s boyfriend.
….I’m more comfortable in Shamata clothes (rags) than fancy fashion attire.
….I’ve experienced my share of grief and loss—depression at times too …but truthfully I don’t think I ever felt as needy, troubled, or obsessed with being desirable—how I look, or aging in the same way many of the women felt in these stories.
Overall - I’m somewhat indifferent to these stories —
but I appreciate Lisa’s candor at the same time.
Favorite sentence:
“Those were the days before OLD PEOPLE joined Facebook”.
About 3.5 ….. I’m feeling generous and will rate up!
….6 hours and 56 minutes
I drifted occasionally listening to Lisa’s new book.
I like Lisa Taddeo—but either I wasn’t much in the mood for these 9-listening-stories or other distractions were pulling at me.
Mostly -
- I thought these stories were pretty good in the depressing way life can present itself.
And -
- I took note to appreciate my ‘much-less-drama-free-life.
Beautiful women had bountiful problems….
Me:
….I’ve never been tall ….
or blond. So nothing to worry about that.
….I never took heroin.
….I never tried to steal another woman’s boyfriend.
….I’m more comfortable in Shamata clothes (rags) than fancy fashion attire.
….I’ve experienced my share of grief and loss—depression at times too …but truthfully I don’t think I ever felt as needy, troubled, or obsessed with being desirable—how I look, or aging in the same way many of the women felt in these stories.
Overall - I’m somewhat indifferent to these stories —
but I appreciate Lisa’s candor at the same time.
Favorite sentence:
“Those were the days before OLD PEOPLE joined Facebook”.
About 3.5 ….. I’m feeling generous and will rate up!
September 18, 2022
2.5 this made me feel gross and like a woman who hates women
May 2, 2024
Nine short stories from the author of Three Women and Animal, both of which I really enjoyed. As in her full length pieces, these short stories are centred on women: their worries, desires and relationships. Most are harsh and unsparing – I found little room for humour in these pieces. Love is often coveted but is frequently out of reach and sometimes unrequited. The sex comes with abuse or is of a trivial, throw away nature. There is desperation (even sometimes thoughts of suicide) amid an all embracing mood of unfulfillment.
So the stories are dark, that’s no real surprise after reading Taddeo’s earlier books, but there is a lot here to engage the reader. The tales are bold, unpredictable and varied enough to keep you guessing. Sometimes sentences are written using short, staccato rhythms and at other times the delivery is loose and meandering. I found it an exciting, unpredictable collection, even if several stories failed to fully draw me in. My favourites are Beautiful People, Grace Magorian, Air Supply and Maid Marian. Each of these forced me to draw breath and contemplate what I’d read as I arrived at its conclusion.
If you’re in the mood for lust, loneliness, loss and longing then look no further, this collection has it in spades. Also, if you’ve sampled and appreciated the author’s previous work then I think you’ll find plenty to enjoy here.
My thanks to Bloomsbury Publishing for supplying a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
So the stories are dark, that’s no real surprise after reading Taddeo’s earlier books, but there is a lot here to engage the reader. The tales are bold, unpredictable and varied enough to keep you guessing. Sometimes sentences are written using short, staccato rhythms and at other times the delivery is loose and meandering. I found it an exciting, unpredictable collection, even if several stories failed to fully draw me in. My favourites are Beautiful People, Grace Magorian, Air Supply and Maid Marian. Each of these forced me to draw breath and contemplate what I’d read as I arrived at its conclusion.
If you’re in the mood for lust, loneliness, loss and longing then look no further, this collection has it in spades. Also, if you’ve sampled and appreciated the author’s previous work then I think you’ll find plenty to enjoy here.
My thanks to Bloomsbury Publishing for supplying a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
May 19, 2022
*Special thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing this e-ARC in exchange for an honest review. Pub date: June 14, 2022
TW: death, parental death, rape, statutory rape, miscarriage, stillbirth, ageism, sexism, catfishing, suicide, suicide ideation (A LOT), and probably 100 more. This is unnecessarily vulgar, seemingly for shock value and not for substance.
Painfully cynical, miserable women that are cliches of everything society has historically told women what they should be upset about. This furthers the narrative that women need a man or children to be worthy and is the book form of an eating disorder waiting to happen. Lazy and quite pretentious, in a very upper-middle class, middle-aged white female way.
TW: death, parental death, rape, statutory rape, miscarriage, stillbirth, ageism, sexism, catfishing, suicide, suicide ideation (A LOT), and probably 100 more. This is unnecessarily vulgar, seemingly for shock value and not for substance.
Painfully cynical, miserable women that are cliches of everything society has historically told women what they should be upset about. This furthers the narrative that women need a man or children to be worthy and is the book form of an eating disorder waiting to happen. Lazy and quite pretentious, in a very upper-middle class, middle-aged white female way.
January 14, 2024
”Every single chick cares more about hot guys than another woman’s pain.”
If you think this quote is harsh, wait til you read some of the others. Put it this way, don't read this book if you're not feeling good about yourself. Or at least ok. As it's filled with dark, dark stories, despite all the sunshine.
Vodka and tonic, 84 calories. 1 cup of kale, 33 calories.
This is what the protagonist of the first story subsists on. Every waking hour is spent doing a calorie count, spending time on the next beauty treatment due to be ticked off her list. Along with hours and hours spent doing brutal workouts at the gym. She has nice thighs. To be a fly on the wall for the speech she was giving that night where she was guest of honour. In vodka veritas.
”All these years later, all these diets later, you are still mostly the same size. If only people knew how much work went into your weight.”
The Bridget Jones cuteness factor of calorie counting and boyfriend obsessing is not here amongst these food starved and love hungry women.
Nine stories of absolute brittleness, jealousy, self-obsession and Schadenfreude. With friends like these, who needs enemies? Put it another way, whatever happened to the sisterhood? As the women in these stories are not shy about showing they are out for what they can get, and put themselves above all others to be at the front of the queue for what they feel they’re owed.
No wonder these ladies are brutal to themselves and each other, they’re starving!
”Become More Beautiful, you wrote at the top of your vision board.”
Something to add to my vision board?
Obsess, obsessing, obsession. About themselves. They’re too old, too fat, too rich, too poor. But never too thin. Never ever ever. Too, too, too. About men. That they want. Or don’t want someone else to have. Can’t live without. Why didn’t he pick me! No matter how poorly they’re treated or unfairly. No matter if the man doesn’t deserve the time of day from her. Happy to be “sloppy seconds” or an occasional mistress. Because it’s a man’s world after all. And beggars can’t be choosers.
"Beauty never went out of style in the vacuum of the penis….”
The dark humour appealed to me, despite its viciousness. Our vodka and tonic, kale eating friend spent five hours getting ready to go to an event which lasted for four hours.
Another felt washed up at 42. Even though she was actually 46. An actress whose glory days were behind her, she could not understand that the love of her life (possibly, maybe) was going out with a - pause for breath - fat chick.
”The famous actress wondered if any woman had every been happy for any other woman in the history of the world. With the exception, of course, of their daughters.”
Such emptiness. Such hollowness.
This collection revolves around women of all ages and demographics who tie their self worth completely based on their sexual allure to men. Whether or not the men are worth the bother, as there’s always another broad around the corner.
There’s a lot of rage here. A burning stench of hatred to other women and the men they supposedly obsess over. There’s a paradoxical enjoyment of their own “suffering”. And yet, what else are they to do?
These stories shine a brutal light on ageism and sexism, and what defines beauty, which I imagine was Lisa Taddeo’s aim. And which she’s hit the bullseye with. How disposable we all are.
I was trying to understand what deep place this self hatred was coming from. So I hopped online as I really didn't know much about Lisa Taddeo’s background (bar that her first two novels were quite sensational, or should that be sensationalist?). This article is fascinating and very telling. She talks about being tired of having to apologise to men and to walk around eggshells in regards to their feelings. I hear her. There’s harsh content and crude language, so don’t read it if you’re easily offended.
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandst...
While I was appalled by the characters and their situations, perversely I enjoyed this collection. Because it’s raw and it’s honest. And it’s made me curious to perhaps read her earlier works, which would never have crossed my radar if I’d not read this.
Shout out to Randwick City Library for having such a current and important book available via Overdrive.
The dedication page says it all really:
Trigger warnings!
Sexual abuse, suicidal thoughts, suicide, stillbirth, abortion, rape, drug taking.
It's messy.
If you think this quote is harsh, wait til you read some of the others. Put it this way, don't read this book if you're not feeling good about yourself. Or at least ok. As it's filled with dark, dark stories, despite all the sunshine.
Vodka and tonic, 84 calories. 1 cup of kale, 33 calories.
This is what the protagonist of the first story subsists on. Every waking hour is spent doing a calorie count, spending time on the next beauty treatment due to be ticked off her list. Along with hours and hours spent doing brutal workouts at the gym. She has nice thighs. To be a fly on the wall for the speech she was giving that night where she was guest of honour. In vodka veritas.
”All these years later, all these diets later, you are still mostly the same size. If only people knew how much work went into your weight.”
The Bridget Jones cuteness factor of calorie counting and boyfriend obsessing is not here amongst these food starved and love hungry women.
Nine stories of absolute brittleness, jealousy, self-obsession and Schadenfreude. With friends like these, who needs enemies? Put it another way, whatever happened to the sisterhood? As the women in these stories are not shy about showing they are out for what they can get, and put themselves above all others to be at the front of the queue for what they feel they’re owed.
No wonder these ladies are brutal to themselves and each other, they’re starving!
”Become More Beautiful, you wrote at the top of your vision board.”
Something to add to my vision board?
Obsess, obsessing, obsession. About themselves. They’re too old, too fat, too rich, too poor. But never too thin. Never ever ever. Too, too, too. About men. That they want. Or don’t want someone else to have. Can’t live without. Why didn’t he pick me! No matter how poorly they’re treated or unfairly. No matter if the man doesn’t deserve the time of day from her. Happy to be “sloppy seconds” or an occasional mistress. Because it’s a man’s world after all. And beggars can’t be choosers.
"Beauty never went out of style in the vacuum of the penis….”
The dark humour appealed to me, despite its viciousness. Our vodka and tonic, kale eating friend spent five hours getting ready to go to an event which lasted for four hours.
Another felt washed up at 42. Even though she was actually 46. An actress whose glory days were behind her, she could not understand that the love of her life (possibly, maybe) was going out with a - pause for breath - fat chick.
”The famous actress wondered if any woman had every been happy for any other woman in the history of the world. With the exception, of course, of their daughters.”
Such emptiness. Such hollowness.
This collection revolves around women of all ages and demographics who tie their self worth completely based on their sexual allure to men. Whether or not the men are worth the bother, as there’s always another broad around the corner.
There’s a lot of rage here. A burning stench of hatred to other women and the men they supposedly obsess over. There’s a paradoxical enjoyment of their own “suffering”. And yet, what else are they to do?
These stories shine a brutal light on ageism and sexism, and what defines beauty, which I imagine was Lisa Taddeo’s aim. And which she’s hit the bullseye with. How disposable we all are.
I was trying to understand what deep place this self hatred was coming from. So I hopped online as I really didn't know much about Lisa Taddeo’s background (bar that her first two novels were quite sensational, or should that be sensationalist?). This article is fascinating and very telling. She talks about being tired of having to apologise to men and to walk around eggshells in regards to their feelings. I hear her. There’s harsh content and crude language, so don’t read it if you’re easily offended.
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandst...
While I was appalled by the characters and their situations, perversely I enjoyed this collection. Because it’s raw and it’s honest. And it’s made me curious to perhaps read her earlier works, which would never have crossed my radar if I’d not read this.
Shout out to Randwick City Library for having such a current and important book available via Overdrive.
The dedication page says it all really:
”For all the girls
Who’ve loved before”
Trigger warnings!
Sexual abuse, suicidal thoughts, suicide, stillbirth, abortion, rape, drug taking.
It's messy.
Read
April 21, 2022Well-written, but DNFed.
I read the first two stories (3/5 and 2/5 stars), both of which feature women who obsess over their weights, appearances, ages, and love lives. When the third story started with the POV character smiling about the death of a model because she was glad there was one fewer beautiful woman in the world, I finally decided I had had enough.
Ghost Lover represents yet another entry into the ever growing sub-genre of contemporary fiction in which fully grown women--specifically, white, middle or upper class, American women--are depicted as stale teenagers: self-involved, overly judgmental of their own appearances as well as those of other women, and unhappy in their love lives with thoughtless, blandly awful men.
If it were just a matter of one or two books/stories featuring such women, this review wouldn't be nearly so harsh. But now that these incredibly tedious, awful people have become the default depiction of white, American women (a group of which I am a member), their omnipresence has become, frankly, insulting. Still weirder, such stories are typically marketed as feminist, even though their depictions of women more often feel blatantly misogynistic, if occasionally with a late-stage "the patriarchy made me do it" twist.
These characters are old clichés brought to life through specific, carefully chosen details (and Taddeo is a good writer). They also tend to resemble the most insufferable people I know, thus offering neither relatable perspectives nor new ones. As I read, I wanted to shake these women and tell them to grow up, to care about something other than themselves. And then I wanted to walk away and never interact with them again.
Publishers, take note: being a realistic female character does not mean being a shallow, self-conscious shell of a human being. There are lots of different perspectives and personalities in the world. Please think more broadly when choosing which ones you applaud and promote.
I read the first two stories (3/5 and 2/5 stars), both of which feature women who obsess over their weights, appearances, ages, and love lives. When the third story started with the POV character smiling about the death of a model because she was glad there was one fewer beautiful woman in the world, I finally decided I had had enough.
Ghost Lover represents yet another entry into the ever growing sub-genre of contemporary fiction in which fully grown women--specifically, white, middle or upper class, American women--are depicted as stale teenagers: self-involved, overly judgmental of their own appearances as well as those of other women, and unhappy in their love lives with thoughtless, blandly awful men.
If it were just a matter of one or two books/stories featuring such women, this review wouldn't be nearly so harsh. But now that these incredibly tedious, awful people have become the default depiction of white, American women (a group of which I am a member), their omnipresence has become, frankly, insulting. Still weirder, such stories are typically marketed as feminist, even though their depictions of women more often feel blatantly misogynistic, if occasionally with a late-stage "the patriarchy made me do it" twist.
These characters are old clichés brought to life through specific, carefully chosen details (and Taddeo is a good writer). They also tend to resemble the most insufferable people I know, thus offering neither relatable perspectives nor new ones. As I read, I wanted to shake these women and tell them to grow up, to care about something other than themselves. And then I wanted to walk away and never interact with them again.
Publishers, take note: being a realistic female character does not mean being a shallow, self-conscious shell of a human being. There are lots of different perspectives and personalities in the world. Please think more broadly when choosing which ones you applaud and promote.
July 29, 2022
How can someone who calls themselves a woman even write this? Misogynistic, ageist, racist, fat phobic, and glorifying of grooming and sexually abusing minors. I can’t believe I wasted an entire afternoon on this garbage.
September 8, 2022
No. The stress you put yourself to read this book is just not worth it.
November 11, 2024
okay, so for me ghost lover belongs to a genealogy of domestic dread literary fiction like mary gaitskill's bad behavior and emma cline's daddy. if i were to rank these three white women plumbing the psychosexual dysfunctions of other white women (+ men), it would look something like this....
1. mary gaitskill's highly unwell perverts >>>>>
2. lisa taddeo's object-obsessed young girls gallivanting dangerously
3. emma cline's gray men (of hollywood) and their sad female companions
i have such mixed feelings about this collection. at certain moments, lisa taddeo is able to hit on language + meaning in a way where suburban malaise seems for the first time fresh and innovating. and then, shortly thereafter, she'll string together a sentence or paragraph so full of itself i want to roll my eyes.
her attention to language/syntax/objects is at times so bad it's good, and at others, so good it's bad. does this make sense? whereas mary gaitskill focalizes feeling (emotion, behavior, trauma, familial/romantic history) in a way which forces her setting/set dressings to become secondary (and rightfully so), lisa taddeo injects her work with such intensely technicolor consumer fetishism that feelings and behavior are regularly interrupted so we can......pause and sketch out in explicit detail what outfit her characters are wearing (calfskin boots? pleather skirts? cowl neck dresses? etc.), the kinds of food they eat (but the food should almost always signal wealth!), the hotels they've stayed at, the makeup they wear, the brands of cars they've been in, the tropical cities they've skipped through.........
taddeo's work is obsessed with its objects. sure, you can argue this obsession is itself a commentary on class and mirrors the aesthetic concerns of her rich, emotionally detached characters, but after a point, it begins to feel like taddeo herself is bewitched by this aesthetic performance, that to her meaning is gathered through the objects we accumulate and not the behaviors we engage in.
in other words, it bored me. it could not hold my attention forever. frankly, the interiority of her worlds paled or fell by the wayside with a frequency that made me long for mary gaitskill's perverted rich freaks, who are so off-beat and absurd you don't care to know what they're wearing, or what they look like beyond their erect, lively necks.
all this to say...........yawn! let's see something new! you can't be a one trick pony like this, taddeo. i wasn't even mad at the hateful, jealous, sex-obsessed, aesthetically paranoid women she wrote, because they weren't egregiously bad or secondary to her men the way i remember emma cline's work. the worst for me was this meaningless aesthetic info-dumping. sometimes it coalesced in a way that seemed atmospheric, or haunting, but for the most part it was like a shiny, coercive distraction—the commercials so bright, so loud, so gaudy, you can't look away, even as your attention is mined and you're being sold to.
(emma cline is worse than both gaitskill and taddeo because in addition to failing to capture my attention from the angle of feeling/behavior/psychological makeup, her set dressings were rendered colorless and lackadaisical in nearly every story in her daddy collection. sorry.)
3.3/5 stars for me!
1. mary gaitskill's highly unwell perverts >>>>>
2. lisa taddeo's object-obsessed young girls gallivanting dangerously
3. emma cline's gray men (of hollywood) and their sad female companions
i have such mixed feelings about this collection. at certain moments, lisa taddeo is able to hit on language + meaning in a way where suburban malaise seems for the first time fresh and innovating. and then, shortly thereafter, she'll string together a sentence or paragraph so full of itself i want to roll my eyes.
her attention to language/syntax/objects is at times so bad it's good, and at others, so good it's bad. does this make sense? whereas mary gaitskill focalizes feeling (emotion, behavior, trauma, familial/romantic history) in a way which forces her setting/set dressings to become secondary (and rightfully so), lisa taddeo injects her work with such intensely technicolor consumer fetishism that feelings and behavior are regularly interrupted so we can......pause and sketch out in explicit detail what outfit her characters are wearing (calfskin boots? pleather skirts? cowl neck dresses? etc.), the kinds of food they eat (but the food should almost always signal wealth!), the hotels they've stayed at, the makeup they wear, the brands of cars they've been in, the tropical cities they've skipped through.........
taddeo's work is obsessed with its objects. sure, you can argue this obsession is itself a commentary on class and mirrors the aesthetic concerns of her rich, emotionally detached characters, but after a point, it begins to feel like taddeo herself is bewitched by this aesthetic performance, that to her meaning is gathered through the objects we accumulate and not the behaviors we engage in.
in other words, it bored me. it could not hold my attention forever. frankly, the interiority of her worlds paled or fell by the wayside with a frequency that made me long for mary gaitskill's perverted rich freaks, who are so off-beat and absurd you don't care to know what they're wearing, or what they look like beyond their erect, lively necks.
all this to say...........yawn! let's see something new! you can't be a one trick pony like this, taddeo. i wasn't even mad at the hateful, jealous, sex-obsessed, aesthetically paranoid women she wrote, because they weren't egregiously bad or secondary to her men the way i remember emma cline's work. the worst for me was this meaningless aesthetic info-dumping. sometimes it coalesced in a way that seemed atmospheric, or haunting, but for the most part it was like a shiny, coercive distraction—the commercials so bright, so loud, so gaudy, you can't look away, even as your attention is mined and you're being sold to.
(emma cline is worse than both gaitskill and taddeo because in addition to failing to capture my attention from the angle of feeling/behavior/psychological makeup, her set dressings were rendered colorless and lackadaisical in nearly every story in her daddy collection. sorry.)
3.3/5 stars for me!
June 21, 2022
Terrible. Like most everyone else has stated this book is full of fat phobia and narcissistic people. Focusing on calories, “macintosh assed” young women, how evil it is that young women can date older men leaving us older women in the lurch etc. Are people really like the women in these stories? If so someone please help us all. Forty two is not old. It’s ok to be the natural size that you are.
The writing in this book made me cringe. I guess I don’t get the appeal.
The writing in this book made me cringe. I guess I don’t get the appeal.
June 1, 2022
I really want to like Lisa Taddeo: she writes daringly and boldly, and she takes me into the “land of the cool” where everyone acts in ways that are simultaneously familiar and exotic.
I want to like her SO MUCH that I was determined to read and love Ghost Lover after failing to connect with her last novel, Animal (which a friend told me was “totally me” and I just “had to read it.”)
And indeed, I finished the book with a strong admiration for her uncanny ability to sum up her characters in just one or two probing sentences. (For instance, in the story American Girl, she writes this about a very hot senatorial candidate with a trio of adoring women: “…as for his fiancée, he had never seen the marks on her wrist because there was now a numerical tattoo on one of them and on the other, she wore a bangle made by starving girls in Uganda.” In another, Maid Marion, a woman notes that her ex-lover’s wife has “a waffle-knit bathrobe that weighed more than Noni’s whole life.”) Continually, I’d encounter sentences like these and gasp at her incredible power of observation.
Speaking about these characters, though – most of them are unfulfilled, hedonistic women who are inevitably svelte, hungering, living in rarefied air, and very aware of their own looks in comparison to friends and competitors. For them, men are often an elusive and quixotic prize (in Maid Marion, Taddeo writes about Noni, “It was the opposite gender that had always eluded her. It seemed they always wanted something she hadn’t thought about. It was like going to the market for tea cake ingredients and coming home without the fucking English Breakfast.” Another description of Noni: “Noni was different. Neither gleaming nor wrecked. She was broken but perennially glued together.”)
These women feel empty and discarded once they reach a certain age – their late 30s. Much attention is paid to appearances and comparing appearances. (In Air Supply, the narrator says, ““Sara was –and still is—prettier than me in a slutty 1990s sort of way.”) As a straight, married woman who adores her many girlfriends and who doesn’t think one woman loses when others win, this was a steep hill to climb.
But still. Many – not all, but many – of the stories captured me and Lisa Taddeo’s writing is masterly and astute. Her concepts are powerful: for example, in the eponymous story, the dating app Ghost Lovers enables more ordinary girls to pursue their crushes while remaining composed in a Cyrano de Bergerac ruse. Other stories I loved are Air Supply, Maid Marion, Grace Magorian, and American Girl.
I may not be the ideal reader but I’m still glad I read the collection of nine stories. I developed an appreciation for this author’s craft and recommend this book for literary readers. I am grateful to Avid Reader Press – a Simon & Schuster imprint – for enabling me to be an early reader in exchange for an honest review.
I want to like her SO MUCH that I was determined to read and love Ghost Lover after failing to connect with her last novel, Animal (which a friend told me was “totally me” and I just “had to read it.”)
And indeed, I finished the book with a strong admiration for her uncanny ability to sum up her characters in just one or two probing sentences. (For instance, in the story American Girl, she writes this about a very hot senatorial candidate with a trio of adoring women: “…as for his fiancée, he had never seen the marks on her wrist because there was now a numerical tattoo on one of them and on the other, she wore a bangle made by starving girls in Uganda.” In another, Maid Marion, a woman notes that her ex-lover’s wife has “a waffle-knit bathrobe that weighed more than Noni’s whole life.”) Continually, I’d encounter sentences like these and gasp at her incredible power of observation.
Speaking about these characters, though – most of them are unfulfilled, hedonistic women who are inevitably svelte, hungering, living in rarefied air, and very aware of their own looks in comparison to friends and competitors. For them, men are often an elusive and quixotic prize (in Maid Marion, Taddeo writes about Noni, “It was the opposite gender that had always eluded her. It seemed they always wanted something she hadn’t thought about. It was like going to the market for tea cake ingredients and coming home without the fucking English Breakfast.” Another description of Noni: “Noni was different. Neither gleaming nor wrecked. She was broken but perennially glued together.”)
These women feel empty and discarded once they reach a certain age – their late 30s. Much attention is paid to appearances and comparing appearances. (In Air Supply, the narrator says, ““Sara was –and still is—prettier than me in a slutty 1990s sort of way.”) As a straight, married woman who adores her many girlfriends and who doesn’t think one woman loses when others win, this was a steep hill to climb.
But still. Many – not all, but many – of the stories captured me and Lisa Taddeo’s writing is masterly and astute. Her concepts are powerful: for example, in the eponymous story, the dating app Ghost Lovers enables more ordinary girls to pursue their crushes while remaining composed in a Cyrano de Bergerac ruse. Other stories I loved are Air Supply, Maid Marion, Grace Magorian, and American Girl.
I may not be the ideal reader but I’m still glad I read the collection of nine stories. I developed an appreciation for this author’s craft and recommend this book for literary readers. I am grateful to Avid Reader Press – a Simon & Schuster imprint – for enabling me to be an early reader in exchange for an honest review.
June 23, 2025
re-read. bette than the first time. Every story has so many nuances and interesting insights into the things that go into a women's desire and who desires her.
January 14, 2023
I often wish someone would vet my head. Take a clipboard and a big red pen and tell me if that want is something that will bite me upon receiving it. If that need was really just the patriarchy talking. I want to be pretty more than I’d like to admit. More than I want other things I know I’m supposed to want more. When I was thirteen my great grandfather died, and I spent the entirety of his funeral worried that the Abercrombie babydoll dress I wore wasn’t as flattering sitting down as it was posing in the mirror that morning. Eventually I remembered where I was a made myself cry so I could match my sniffling family. Taddeo is a master in ripping out those pages of my journal and shoving them in my face, showing me how haunted and lonely the rest of my life will be if I don’t find other things to care about. Her characters make me feel seen and sad and scared that I’ll be like them one day. these stories are warnings of a sort. We get to see what happens AFTER you get involved with your hot older writing professor. Once the excitement that surrounds all the sneaking around and the late night office hours has worn off, and you're left alone with your wasted potential, hating yourself while he's off somewhere eating expensive pasta with his wife and forgetting your last name.
A bride, a groom and his mistress all prepare for the big day. The mistress stews in rage and heavy lipstick, envying the bride for her youth and fairytale ending. The bride wanders from table to table in her gown and flowers, thinking about a man in a cowboy hat from her past, fully and tragically aware that her future will be mealy and predictable. The groom smirks and smooths his hair, very accustomed to getting everything he wants.
A ghost watches her husband from the other side, flinching at who he has become in her absence. Or maybe he has always been that way, death just gave her clarity.
Aging and friendship and frenzied fixation. The familiar humiliation of one-sided wantings. Desire and shame and how come B seems to always follow A no matter how many fancy therapists I see?
Full of snark and sorrow and endlessly underlineable. Better than Animal. Read it.
A bride, a groom and his mistress all prepare for the big day. The mistress stews in rage and heavy lipstick, envying the bride for her youth and fairytale ending. The bride wanders from table to table in her gown and flowers, thinking about a man in a cowboy hat from her past, fully and tragically aware that her future will be mealy and predictable. The groom smirks and smooths his hair, very accustomed to getting everything he wants.
A ghost watches her husband from the other side, flinching at who he has become in her absence. Or maybe he has always been that way, death just gave her clarity.
Aging and friendship and frenzied fixation. The familiar humiliation of one-sided wantings. Desire and shame and how come B seems to always follow A no matter how many fancy therapists I see?
Full of snark and sorrow and endlessly underlineable. Better than Animal. Read it.
October 11, 2022
A cynical look at societal norms conditioning women to obsess over beauty and ageing, their bodies and counting calories, makeup and “getting more looks” sounds like something I would love, right? Not really!
Halfway through, I got tired of these stereotyped women-who-hate-women characters. I’m missing the self-awareness that the narrator of Animal had (a novel where I thought Taddeo hadn’t gone far enough, ironically). Here, taking all of these women’s experiences to the extreme makes them less believable and, ultimately, less relatable. There’s something very caricatural and male-gazey about these stories, and I get all that internalized misogyny, I do, but it’s perplexing that even the innermost lives of these women feel performative. The self-objectification and comparisons grated on my nerves… like a mental tragic chorus popping in just to spell out their flaws.
With a few cringe-worthy phrased exceptions, I appreciate Lisa Taddeo’s writing in these stories and I will continue to read her, but this collection was a miss for me.
Halfway through, I got tired of these stereotyped women-who-hate-women characters. I’m missing the self-awareness that the narrator of Animal had (a novel where I thought Taddeo hadn’t gone far enough, ironically). Here, taking all of these women’s experiences to the extreme makes them less believable and, ultimately, less relatable. There’s something very caricatural and male-gazey about these stories, and I get all that internalized misogyny, I do, but it’s perplexing that even the innermost lives of these women feel performative. The self-objectification and comparisons grated on my nerves… like a mental tragic chorus popping in just to spell out their flaws.
With a few cringe-worthy phrased exceptions, I appreciate Lisa Taddeo’s writing in these stories and I will continue to read her, but this collection was a miss for me.
October 19, 2022
This last year I've been becoming rather found of short stories and got intrigued by this one but unfortunately none of the story was appealing to me. Not my cup of tea
November 3, 2022
I would give this book zero stars if I could.
Off the bat, I feel that this book was misrepresented. The title and the flap copy do not in any way accurately convey what kind of stories this book contains. Here's what you're not getting: any kind of story about a text-forwarding service that manages your romantic life.
Here's what you are getting: a series of flat, plotless stories about middle-aged women who hate themselves and other women. The forty-something woman who detests twenty-something with "breasts that aren't sagging yet" and counts the calories in her salad dressing is overdone and frankly boring. My general philosophy is not to assume the author believes what their characters believe, but the internalized misogyny and pro-anorexia sentiments expressed were so pervasive in this book that it forces me to wonder if the author really feels this way about herself and other women. If she does, I feel truly sorry for her.
I ended up DNFing this book about halfway through, which is something I really, really hate to do. I could not take another word. Save yourself the trouble and the money and skip this one.
Off the bat, I feel that this book was misrepresented. The title and the flap copy do not in any way accurately convey what kind of stories this book contains. Here's what you're not getting: any kind of story about a text-forwarding service that manages your romantic life.
Here's what you are getting: a series of flat, plotless stories about middle-aged women who hate themselves and other women. The forty-something woman who detests twenty-something with "breasts that aren't sagging yet" and counts the calories in her salad dressing is overdone and frankly boring. My general philosophy is not to assume the author believes what their characters believe, but the internalized misogyny and pro-anorexia sentiments expressed were so pervasive in this book that it forces me to wonder if the author really feels this way about herself and other women. If she does, I feel truly sorry for her.
I ended up DNFing this book about halfway through, which is something I really, really hate to do. I could not take another word. Save yourself the trouble and the money and skip this one.
August 3, 2022
Thanks to NetGalley & Avid Reader Press for an eARC of this book. The following review is my honest reflection on the text provided.
Because I enjoy creating more work for myself, I've done a mini review for each short story. It helps me rate the collection as a whole, though, so off we go!
Ghost Lover ★★.5
ABUSE | ROMANCE | SOCIAL MEDIA | WEIGHT
This is a controversial, difficult story. Ari is choosing to tell her truth in a very dishonest way which has profound repercussions outside her own life. She is heartbroken, amplifying this side of her that seems capable of being cold and calculated in emotional situations. By choosing herself and her fame over another's reputation, she's clearly not a heroic character. Unfortunately realistic, but not inspirational. She's pretty unlikeable from the first few paragraphs, but it seems to become a competition to see how much worse she can get in a short story. This first story is not one I would have expected from the author of Three Women , but it was a captivating read. I can't complain about the writing skill or style, just the content. It makes me a little worried about what's to come, though…
Forty-Two ★★★
ROMANCE | WOMEN'S FICTION
The two women in this narrative could not be more different - Joan is a cyclone of toxic thoughts and manipulative, self-serving plans, while Molly is naive but selfless and conscientious of her life and its realities. Joan is in love with Jack for what he is on the surface, while Molly may be using him for what he represents - husband/father/future - and she protects that vision. Neither is very happy; they both seem to have an idea of what they want but are approaching it in (probably) the wrong way. I didn't like Joan, but I liked how it twisted around full circle in the end. Emotionally evocative writing, but another slightly toxic narrative.
"The day of a wedding is always about three people. The groom, the bride, and the person most unrequitedly in love with the groom or the bride."
Beautiful People ★★★
ROMANCE | SOCIAL MEDIA
Almost a modern fairy tale, though the motivations behind most characters' actions are far from pure. The emotions drive this story - Jane is very much in her head, and while this is probably the least toxic story so far, it's not a happy ending - or very feminist - even if it's very realistic.
Padua, 1966 ★★★.5
ADDICTION | GHOSTS | INFIDELITY
This is a sad one. I don't have a lot of sympathy for Miranda - chasing excitement and freedom and missing the stability and security. The grass is always greener and all that nonsense. I mostly felt bad for the narrator. We hear the worst parts of her story secondhand, making it even worse. Difficult choices and difficult situations.
"You can sense your own mortality more in the presence of someone who has found a new bead on life."
Grace Magorian ★★.5
ABUSE | FAMILY | SOCIAL MEDIA
Another sad older woman, bitter about love and the world, becomes delusional when someone shows the slightest interest. This feels like recycled material from several previous stories, and I didn't particularly enjoy it.
Air Supply ★★.5
FRIENDSHIP
Really focused on the male gaze - the only real details in the story are about the men checking out these women. A lot of stuff is glazed over, making the story feel pointless. It's hard to tell whether they're terrible or excellent friends. Still, I think it's clear Sara is a better friend than the narrator deserves considering how much time she spends competing with Sara, trying to figure out who is prettier or getting more attention. It might be an honest depiction of a specific type of friendship, but it's a very strange one.
Maid Marian ★★★
INFIDELITY | ROMANCE
Unrequited love and poor decisions. I don't have much to say about this one; it was a bit boring - a slightly nasty twist in the end, but nothing unexpected.
American Girl ★★.5
ROMANCE
The same story, a slightly different spin. Shallow people, ambition outweighing truth, fame more important than humanity. It reads as limited or reductive at the very least - these characters are boiled down to their base instincts and have no complexity, leaving them (and the story) quite dull.
A Suburban Weekend ★★★.5
FRIENDSHIP | MENTAL ILLNESS
Strong finish. A complicated female friendship - with competition, awkwardness, and misplaced emotions - but a strong relationship nonetheless. Liv has everything except love, while Fern has lost everything but doesn't care anymore. Disposable men, too many drinks, offhand comments, and imperfect characters.
Overall: ★★★ (rounded up)
This collection made me want to read Three Women again as a reminder that I do like Taddeo's writing. I think it would be a good comparison - fiction vs non-fiction, each comprised of short stories in their own way. I'll have to move it up my TBR before I've forgotten this pretty forgettable book.
Review originally posted here on Britt's Book Blurbs.
Because I enjoy creating more work for myself, I've done a mini review for each short story. It helps me rate the collection as a whole, though, so off we go!
Ghost Lover ★★.5
ABUSE | ROMANCE | SOCIAL MEDIA | WEIGHT
This is a controversial, difficult story. Ari is choosing to tell her truth in a very dishonest way which has profound repercussions outside her own life. She is heartbroken, amplifying this side of her that seems capable of being cold and calculated in emotional situations. By choosing herself and her fame over another's reputation, she's clearly not a heroic character. Unfortunately realistic, but not inspirational. She's pretty unlikeable from the first few paragraphs, but it seems to become a competition to see how much worse she can get in a short story. This first story is not one I would have expected from the author of Three Women , but it was a captivating read. I can't complain about the writing skill or style, just the content. It makes me a little worried about what's to come, though…
Forty-Two ★★★
ROMANCE | WOMEN'S FICTION
The two women in this narrative could not be more different - Joan is a cyclone of toxic thoughts and manipulative, self-serving plans, while Molly is naive but selfless and conscientious of her life and its realities. Joan is in love with Jack for what he is on the surface, while Molly may be using him for what he represents - husband/father/future - and she protects that vision. Neither is very happy; they both seem to have an idea of what they want but are approaching it in (probably) the wrong way. I didn't like Joan, but I liked how it twisted around full circle in the end. Emotionally evocative writing, but another slightly toxic narrative.
"The day of a wedding is always about three people. The groom, the bride, and the person most unrequitedly in love with the groom or the bride."
Beautiful People ★★★
ROMANCE | SOCIAL MEDIA
Almost a modern fairy tale, though the motivations behind most characters' actions are far from pure. The emotions drive this story - Jane is very much in her head, and while this is probably the least toxic story so far, it's not a happy ending - or very feminist - even if it's very realistic.
Padua, 1966 ★★★.5
ADDICTION | GHOSTS | INFIDELITY
This is a sad one. I don't have a lot of sympathy for Miranda - chasing excitement and freedom and missing the stability and security. The grass is always greener and all that nonsense. I mostly felt bad for the narrator. We hear the worst parts of her story secondhand, making it even worse. Difficult choices and difficult situations.
"You can sense your own mortality more in the presence of someone who has found a new bead on life."
Grace Magorian ★★.5
ABUSE | FAMILY | SOCIAL MEDIA
Another sad older woman, bitter about love and the world, becomes delusional when someone shows the slightest interest. This feels like recycled material from several previous stories, and I didn't particularly enjoy it.
Air Supply ★★.5
FRIENDSHIP
Really focused on the male gaze - the only real details in the story are about the men checking out these women. A lot of stuff is glazed over, making the story feel pointless. It's hard to tell whether they're terrible or excellent friends. Still, I think it's clear Sara is a better friend than the narrator deserves considering how much time she spends competing with Sara, trying to figure out who is prettier or getting more attention. It might be an honest depiction of a specific type of friendship, but it's a very strange one.
Maid Marian ★★★
INFIDELITY | ROMANCE
Unrequited love and poor decisions. I don't have much to say about this one; it was a bit boring - a slightly nasty twist in the end, but nothing unexpected.
American Girl ★★.5
ROMANCE
The same story, a slightly different spin. Shallow people, ambition outweighing truth, fame more important than humanity. It reads as limited or reductive at the very least - these characters are boiled down to their base instincts and have no complexity, leaving them (and the story) quite dull.
A Suburban Weekend ★★★.5
FRIENDSHIP | MENTAL ILLNESS
Strong finish. A complicated female friendship - with competition, awkwardness, and misplaced emotions - but a strong relationship nonetheless. Liv has everything except love, while Fern has lost everything but doesn't care anymore. Disposable men, too many drinks, offhand comments, and imperfect characters.
Overall: ★★★ (rounded up)
This collection made me want to read Three Women again as a reminder that I do like Taddeo's writing. I think it would be a good comparison - fiction vs non-fiction, each comprised of short stories in their own way. I'll have to move it up my TBR before I've forgotten this pretty forgettable book.
Review originally posted here on Britt's Book Blurbs.
Amazon | Blog | Bookstagram | Reddit
June 26, 2022
i don’t know…i want to like it but lisa taddeo’s fiction leaves me with such a sour taste in my mouth. why is it all about men who hate women and women who hate their aging chubby bodies? taddeo’s books always serve as a helpful reality check at first (eg. you’re obsessed with this man and he doesn’t care if you live or die), but short story after short story really just beats the dead horse. it also makes me wonder so much about how she feels about her body and her husband and her daughter? it just seems hard to imagine someone writing THIS much on these themes and not feeling that way herself
January 21, 2023
The title story Ghost Lover was my favourite from this collection (definitely worth reading this short story if you aren’t interested in the collection). I’ve been following Taddeo after reading her non-fiction title Three Women a couple years ago. I’ve yet to read her fiction debut Animal as I’ve been saving it for the feminine rage book club. I can always count on Taddeo to explore feminine rage and desire but this collection didn’t excite me in the way I was hoping. I do love the sharpness of her prose and the way she crafts characters but I kept wanting more from each story. The observations on rage, obsession, and desire were captivating but felt unfinished.
TW: rape, SA, body dysmorphia, ED, toxic relationships, suicidal thoughts, loss of a parent
TW: rape, SA, body dysmorphia, ED, toxic relationships, suicidal thoughts, loss of a parent
June 21, 2022
For once I really enjoyed and appreciated reading an author who wrote in quite a rambling stream of consciousness way. It really related itself to the text and I found it to be exactly what some of the stories needed. That little kick to make sure you are still paying attention. And I definitely was. The stories were all a teeny bit strange, but I loved the diversity and freshness of each one and was even captivated by a couple. I am so glad I love this author finally, because I had started ‘Three Women’ ages ago and couldn’t stand it. Her talent (in my opinion) is maybe best highlighted in short stories.
May 3, 2022
I think I’m in love.
March 29, 2023
3.5/5 stars
Touched on sexuality of mature women, female friendships, celebrity life, suicidal tendencies, and more
Touched on sexuality of mature women, female friendships, celebrity life, suicidal tendencies, and more
January 17, 2023
DNF at 39% into the audiobook. Taddeo’s “Three Women” remains one of the best nonfiction books I’ve ever read. Both “Three Women” and this collection of short stories make the reader actively uncomfortable. The difference is that in her nonfiction work, I felt like she treated the women with immense respect. In “Ghost Lover,” it was like she wrote with the goal of creating the most vapid, weak, fat phobic, ageist, appearance and MAN OBSESSED female characters possible. This book would NEVER pass the Bechdel Test because everything any of these characters did was directly for or about a man. I stopped listening at 39% because this book was not bringing me joy. It was making me angry. Also, maybe it’s just me, but I am BEYOND done with reading about women that are obsessed with counting calories. Can we just move on as a culture, please?
June 3, 2022
While talking to my boss earlier this week, I made the statement "I really could not care less what a man has to say" regarding a popular writer that he was talking about.
I've been trying to read more and more female (or female-identifying) authors. These are voices that I care about, that I want to hear from. That said, I want to like Lisa Taddero. I feel like on paper, it's someone that I SHOULD like, if not, LOVE. That said, "Ghost Lover" is just....eh for me.
First of all, the just...straight up fatphobia in this book is...disgusting. This man is fat. This talk show host is fat. She is fat. He is fat. FAT FAT FAT. This beautiful model has super thin legs and is so beautifullllllllll. So tan and beautiful and young and sexual and pretty and every man wants her and oh my god we get itttttt.
BUT - if you take all of that out, the meat of the stories, the actual stories are okay. I think the first one is a standout. Some of the others are trash, but the first one is the reason that this is two stars rather than zero.
Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for the opportunity to read and review this book.
I've been trying to read more and more female (or female-identifying) authors. These are voices that I care about, that I want to hear from. That said, I want to like Lisa Taddero. I feel like on paper, it's someone that I SHOULD like, if not, LOVE. That said, "Ghost Lover" is just....eh for me.
First of all, the just...straight up fatphobia in this book is...disgusting. This man is fat. This talk show host is fat. She is fat. He is fat. FAT FAT FAT. This beautiful model has super thin legs and is so beautifullllllllll. So tan and beautiful and young and sexual and pretty and every man wants her and oh my god we get itttttt.
BUT - if you take all of that out, the meat of the stories, the actual stories are okay. I think the first one is a standout. Some of the others are trash, but the first one is the reason that this is two stars rather than zero.
Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for the opportunity to read and review this book.
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June 13, 2022Really interesting to read this as my first impression of Taddeo’s writing. Do people find this cloying nihilism arresting? Why is everyone so skinny and obsessed with it? Are these characters supposed to make me feel better about myself? Am I the asshole?
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