this book could've been an email. or, at least, over 100 pages shorter.

i really like like the concept of being given access to everyone's email accounts at work because i'm nosy as hell, but. oh my god. i know it's for the plot, but i think everyone knows that you shouldn't use your work email for private shit, especially when you're going to be a cunt towards your coworkers there? these people are all cunts towards one another, and you're telling me they're writing that stuff to each other? leaving written evidence in the WORK channel? ANJDBJKBJGGG ok. suspension of disbelief. i get it. i had no issues with that, really. but "light, heartwarming, laugh-out-loud hilarious"? did i accidentally read a different book? or, is the line I’m so embarrassed my vagina hurts supposed to be hilarious instead of odd and off-putting? seriously, i started wondering what was wrong with the author to make them consider writing that down. this book was depressing and annoying.

i don't even have it in me to trash-talk jolene. if you need 33 years on earth and snooping through people's emails to realize that everyone in your life is struggling more than they let on... girl. she's mean, has no manners, and every time she has a chance to be a nice person, she steers clear of that road. she even treated her 12 yo neighbor like trash despite knowing she had a difficult situation at home, and then

proceeded to become a youth counselor

? on what grounds? after more-or-less a year of therapy? who allowed her. i hope they do a background check on her and she stays jobless forever. her alcoholism has also not been treated with enough seriousness.

the drama is so forced and boring. everything lines up so easily to get us to the climax, which ends up making it underwhelming. jolene's actions are nonsensical, because every time she can fix things, she acts like a weirdo and makes everything worse. she's just stupid. 

even the backstory plot felt unnecessary. it's just some barely mentioned trauma, only brought up to back up her awful behavior and to make her spiral when someone, rightfully, i'd say, calls her a loser or a weirdo. l o l. it's not fleshed-out enough to make the reader care, and it's not well-integrated into the plot, either. it makes no sense that

some teenager spewing bullshit would force her entire family to move out

. she says that after hearing all the rumors,

she even started thinking that maybe she DID something to hurt her friend because she was so gaslighted

but we know that she didn't? because she says it earlier? and the fact that no one at school offered her counseling when

her friend died

makes no sense. even if her parents are conservative like that.