The Good Part

by Sophie Cousens

Is living the life you’ve wished for really a dream come true?

Lucy Young is twenty-six and tired. Tired of fetching coffees for senior TV producers, sick of going on disastrous dates, and done with living in a damp flat with roommates who never buy toilet paper. After another disappointing date, Lucy stumbles upon a wishing machine. Pushing a coin into the slot, Lucy closes her eyes and wishes with all her might: Please, let me skip to the good part of my life.

When she wakes the next morning to a handsome man, a ring on her finger, a high-powered job, and two storybook-perfect children, Lucy can’t believe this is real—especially when she looks in the mirror, and staring back is her own fortysomething face. Has she really skipped ahead like she’s always wanted, or has she simply forgotten a huge chunk of her life? As Lucy begins to embrace new relationships and the perks of maturity, she’ll have to ask herself: Can she go back to her previous life, and if so, can she stand to leave the good part behind?

• ISBN10: 0593539893
• ISBN13: 9780593539897
• Publish Date: 7 November 2023 (first published 5 October 2023)
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: US
• Imprint: G.P. Putnam's Sons
• Format: Paperback (US Trade)
• Pages: 368
• Language: English
• URL: https://penguinrandomhouse.com/books/isbn/9780593539897

Reviews

[The Romantic Comedy Book Club]

ARC Review for The Good Part. Spoilers removed.

 

Sophie Cousens has quickly become one of my favorite authors. With relatable characters and thought provoking stories, you find yourself walking away with more than you thought one could from a fun loving romantic comedy. Each of her books gives more than it takes and The Good Part is no exception.  

 

If you could skip to the good parts in your life, would you do it? Past the heartbreaks, beyond the failures, leaving behind dashed hopes, only to arrive to a place that holds everything you could have ever imagined. Gorgeous spouse, successful job, money, recognition, the list goes on. Would you make that wish for that type of reward? Lucy Young’s answer was a resounding “Yes!” Failed date after failed date, horrible living conditions, and a dead end job, all Lucy wanted was to get to the point of her life where all of the sacrifice was worth it. At her lowest, drenched from the rain, traumatized by an impromptu date, Lucy enters a store to escape the weather and finds a wishing machine in the back. With nothing else to lose, she wishes to fast forward to the best parts of her life. Ignoring the warning that one should alway be careful what they wish for, Lucy wakes up in a breathtaking bedroom with a gorgeous man beside her. Strange but promising start to the morning until one look in the mirror nearly scares her half to death. Having zero memory of anything that happened between the Wednesday night when she was 26 and this Friday morning where she is now 42, Lucy quickly realizes that while her wish may have come true, it may not be worth giving up the bad  in order to skip ahead to the good.

 

This book was phenomenal! When I initially started it, I wasn’t sure where it was going. Having read all of Sophie Cousens books, I was expecting the same type of romantic comedy genius that I enjoyed in this past. This book was not a contemporary romance but so much more. Venturing towards the genre of women’s fiction, coming of age, or the frowned upon term “chic lit”, we are posed a very important question - if we could skip to the good parts in life, would we? The quick answer for many of us is: YES - same as Lucy. What we discover through her story is that to get to the good, we have to go through the bad because it makes us who we are. We have to experience the ups and downs because those are what shapes us. The in-between is were we make the memories that make those good parts great!

 

While this book didn’t have laugh out loud funny moments, it was completely relatable to women in different stages of their lives.

 

The Good Part is a beautiful reminded that life may be unfair, challenging, and frustrating at moments but finding the good amongst the bad is what makes it worth living each and every day. Even the “good part” of Lucy’s life still had aspects of bad - it just didn’t outweigh it. And that is the challenge, not getting to the good part per say but experiencing enough of life that we learn to balance the good along with the bad, continuously tipping the scale in our favor.