Book Review: Ghosted

Reviewed by Lindsay Crandall

A hilarious, fast-paced dating memoir 

Ghosted: Dating & Other Paramoural Experiences by Jana Eisenstein details one woman’s journey through dating in the early 2010s, before swiping right or left, before checking your messages was as easy as pulling a phone out of your pocket.

Eisenstein’s college years were spent both sober and dateless, waiting for love to find her. As she witnessed “sloppy, drunken hookups” develop into “sloppy, drunken relationships,” she decided to end her time at Boston University and start her first adult relationship: a man eleven years her senior, still excessively bitter about a divorce that had occurred years before.  A move to a new city brings about a new approach to dating—accepting every social invitation she received.  

Her twenties find her embracing a new lifestyle; finding love is now fueled by cheap vodka, nightclubs, and occasionally Craigslist. Ghosted follows Eisenstein’s adventures in dating as she learns to navigate her feelings and what she is willing to accept from a potential partner.

“What I felt after he ghosted wasn’t sadness about the guy I lost, but pure misery about being ghosted yet again, this time by a guy I wasn’t even sure I had feelings for. Worst of all, I had known from the start that that’s how it would end. That seemed to be how all my relationships ended these days.”

We, the readers, get a brief insight into each potential new partner, some of whom have some truly stand-out quirks, including but not limited to, face-licking, toe-sucking, and an ability to simultaneously be both in Tucson and Washington DC.

This fast-paced, witty read should resonate with anyone who has been ghosted in the past. In each new story, Eisenstein aims to balances who she wants to be as a person with how she believes she can get there. “Without the drinking, the flirting, the random sexual encounters, was I in danger of reverting back to the quiet, uneventful life I had shed?” Here, our main character changes and grows in each chapter on her way toward valuing herself.

This memoir comes with a sense of camaraderie. We’re right there with Eisenstein. A wonderfully descriptive storyteller, she is able to breathe new life into these dating stories, able to make even the most mundane detail stand out in a way that feels fresh and new.

Publisher: Atmosphere Press

Genre: Nonfiction / Memoir / Dating

Print Length: 288 pages

ISBN: 978-1639881529

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Thank you for reading Lindsay Crandall’s book review of Ghosted: Dating and Other Paramoural Experiences by Tana Eisenstein! If you liked what you read, please spend some more time with us at the links below.