Book Summary and Reviews of The Guilt Pill by Saumya Dave

The Guilt Pill by Saumya Dave

The Guilt Pill

A Novel

by Saumya Dave

  • Published:
  • Apr 2025, 384 pages
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About this book

Book Summary

What if women could get rid of their guilt?

Maya Patel has it all—her own start-up, a doting husband, and now, a new baby. But behind closed doors, she's drowning. Her newborn has taken a toll on her marriage, her best friend won't return her calls, and her company is hanging on by a thread. The worst part? It's all her fault. If she could just be a better boss, mother, wife, friend… Maybe she wouldn't feel so guilty all the time.

Enter: #Girlboss Liz Anderson, who introduces Maya to the "guilt pill," an experimental supplement that erases female guilt. It's the perfect antidote to Maya's self-blame and imposter syndrome, and she can finally become the woman she's always wanted to be. There's just one catch—for Maya to truly "have it all," she must be willing to risk it all. And as she falls deeper down the pill's guilt-free rabbit hole, her growing ruthlessness could threaten everything she's built for herself…and the family she's worked so hard to protect.

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Reviews

Media Reviews

"The Guilt Pill is a sharp, insightful, funny and deeply human meditation on motherhood and being your own person and where they intersect. Saumya Dave is one of my favorite writers and she has written her best novel yet." —Laura Dave, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Last Thing He Told Me

"The Guilt Pill is the answer to the age-old question of whether a woman can do it all—and whether she should. A powerful rallying cry, a juicy glimpse into startup and influencer culture, and a surprising, intimate portrait of a family strained to breaking by the weight on a new mother's shoulders. Saumya Dave has written a book that's as addictive as its untested supplement. You'll want to share it with everyone you know." —Katie Gutierrez, bestselling author of More Than You'll Ever Know

This information about The Guilt Pill was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.

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Author Information

Saumya Dave

Saumya Dave is the author of Well-Behaved Indian Women, which was a Lilly Singh book club pick, and What a Happy Family. Both have been optioned for film. She is a psychiatrist, adjunct professor at Mount Sinai, and frequent mental health contributor for NBC News. Dave's essays, articles, and poems have been featured in the New York Times, ABC News, Refinery29, and others. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband and son.

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