Review: "The Singles" by Meredith Goldstein

The Singles. They are at every wedding. Where do you seat them? Where will they fit in? Will they cause a scene? These are the questions that plague Bee Evans just days before her country club nuptials. She invited all of her single guests to bring a date but an unfortunate few declined to do so, leaving Bee frantic as to where to put her "singles" on the seating chart and wondering why they couldn't just have the courtesy to bring someone with them!

The Singles by Meredith Goldstein tells the stories of these singles. The first chapter is from the point of view of the frantic bride-to-be, Bee, and the remaining chapters are told from the point of view of her single guests. These guests include one of her bridesmaids, unable to get over her ex, an unreliable old friend from college, a man whom she has never met before whose mother happens to be a friend of her new mother-in-law, and her Uncle Joe. Although their stories rarely intersect, they do weave together here and there as each story comes to a conclusion.

The Singles is going to be a popular beach book! It's light reading at its finest. The story is enjoyable and fast-paced, the characters are people that you really want to know more about, and the book is very well-written. Had I not had to, you know, eat and sleep, I would have read this one through from start to finish without taking a break. There was something compelling about each individual character and I loved the fact that the characters really didn't intersect all that much. They did come together, and artfully so, but I was able to enjoy each story individually as well as a whole.

My only complaint would be that the book was too short. There were several characters whose stories were being told and I would have liked to have heard more about each one. It's not that the stories were not told in completion, but that I was enjoying each individual story so much that I wanted more!

I enjoyed The Singles and can recommend it without hesitation to anyone looking for a light and engaging read. This will be perfect reading material for the warmer and more relaxed days of summer. My thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for providing me with this review copy.