Sandie Herron made me feel good when she said she picked up Wendy Wax’ novel, The Break-Up Book Club, because of my earlier review of the book. It makes a difference, though, when you listen to an audiobook. One thing Sandie liked about the audio was listening to four women narrate the story. If you’re a fan of audiobooks, you might enjoy this one.

The Break-Up Book Club
Written by Wendy Wax
Narrated by: Hillary Huber, Nicole Lewis, Renata Friedman, Cassandra Morris
Unabridged Audiobook
Penguin Audio (5/18/2021)
Listening Length:  12 hours 12 minutes

This is a charming, engrossing book about friendships and how life doesn’t always turn out as you plan.  We follow the lives of four members of a book club that meets at the Between the Covers Bookstore located in a historic carriage house in Atlanta.  The members of the club are of all ages and both sexes and of varying backgrounds yet through a year of sharing and caring, they find they have more in common than they bargained for.

Judith is the wife of Nathan, a successful franchise owner.  When he travels to Europe without her and mistakenly dials her on his cell phone, she discovers that he thinks she’s a “good egg,” not quite the description Judith would give their many years of marriage.  She is determined that when he returns home, they need to find the spark in their relationship again. 

Jasmine is a successful sports agent who has fought her way to the top.  Once on her way to tennis greatness, she now has a daughter who shows great promise in the sport.  Still single, her sister constantly tries to set her up on dates but Jazz just doesn’t have time especially since Rich Hanson left his lofty position in an LA firm to join her own agency.

Sarah is Mitchell’s wife but he is living in Birmingham where his job has taken him, leaving his elderly mother Dorothy living in his home.  Dorothy never felt Sarah was good enough, and her relationship with her daughter-in-law is strained, at best.  Mitchell was traveling home on the weekends, and when he stopped, Sarah goes to him, only to make a shocking discovery as to why he no longer seems interested in either his wife or his mother.

Erin is the youngest and was to marry Josh on New Year’s Day.  Josh and Erin had been together since they were kids, and he was on the verge of his dream of becoming a pitcher for the Atlanta Braves when he develops cold feet.  Erin had filled in for Jasmine’s assistant over the holidays, and the two women hit it off.  The promise of permanent employment brings Erin out of her slump over Josh.

Seemingly different in so many ways, all four women end up at book club.  Through their sharing their views of their recent books and their choices of the next books to read, they learn more about each other and become friends.  As each goes through a break up, with Erin going first, they share their lives and support one another.  They discover a scam that affects them, and the entire club pulls together in a fabulous scene to get the scammer. 

Wendy Wax had a way of making me care about each one of these four women plus the other members of the club.  I wanted to read more about them all, and I cared what happened to them.  The audiobook was narrated by four different women which made the story so much more realistic and dramatic.  I never lost track of each woman’s journey or how they were dealing with the cards they’d been dealt.  Just when they had begun dealing with their own hands, they pulled together to help one another.  And life goes on.