What readers think of Dear Monica Lewinsky, plus links to write your own review.

Jean Dornan is forty-five and still can't account for who she was at nineteen, when a study-abroad program in rural France and a charismatic professor derailed her in ways she's only beginning to understand. In Julia Langbein's audacious and laugh-out-loud funny second novel, Jean's reckoning takes the form of a supernatural guide: Monica Lewinsky, patron saint of women publicly sacrificed for powerful men's mistakes, who escorts Jean back through that lost summer like the flinty, snarky Ghost of Christmas Past. In fact, Monica is the novel's narrator, opening with "The day that Jean Dornan first prayed to me began like any other…" — a genius tactic that makes the time transitions feel inevitable rather than managed.

Something about the pace at which we arrive at the final coupling reminded me of Call Me by Your Name — a sun-soaked coming-of-age, a doomed relationship allowed to unspool slowly. But where Aciman leaves us aching for Elio (Elio Elio Elio...), Langbein makes us ache at Jean — frustrated by her blind spots, frustrated for her, and aware that Monica, for all her saintly radiance, shares that frustration. At its core, this is a sharp examination of female desire and the price women pay for acting on their appetites — while the men involved build churches on the very ground where it all happened. That's not just metaphor: Langbein weaves in the lives of real female martyrs whose suffering was literally consecrated into stone, and the parallel is damning.

I highly recommend this to those who trust a novel that plays it completely straight while the world it describes is completely strange. And given Langbein's doctorate in art history and background in sketch and stand-up comedy, it's no surprise that the book's comedy is load-bearing. Did I mention that it made me laugh? A lot. PS: Her food writing is chef's kiss, too.

Thank you to Doubleday Books and NetGalley for the advance copy. All opinions are my own.

Hilariously funny with biting satire, this book captivates from the beginning as well as looking deeply into how women are viewed and treated and how maybe we treated the real Monica Lewinsky wrongly. Forty-five Jean Dornan revisits her affair when she was 19 with an older professor while in France studying. She sees the parallels with Monica Lewinsky and her situation as both occurred in 1998.

She's been invited to a 20 year reunion as the professor is retiring. Deeply troubled by this past Jean throws herself on the mercy of St Monica Lewinsky (the book starts with the most delightfully satirical story of this saint - and interspersed within the novel are tales of virgin saints hilariously rewritten (though not too far off from the real stories) to contrast these virgins and how the strove to keep their virginity at the expense of having sex in contrast to Jean). Saint Monica guides her through an examination of that six week summer. As the novel unfolds Jean is able to see how her ambition got in her way and then when the professor punished her for their relationship, her life took a trajectory that diminished her.

One of the beauties of the book is the interweaving art history and religious tropes. The other is the cooking aspects. These especially blend the theme of desires one faces in life with the costs for our appetites. And as with the character of Monica, the book asks the question of what does forgiveness look like.

I loved Jean and St Monica with her funny one liners. Such a fun read.