It’s Been a Pleasure, Noni Blake

There are only two things you need to know about this story…

1. Noni Blake is beautiful. She’s beautiful. Beautiful. Absolutely beautiful. Did you get that? If not, don’t worry. Every single person she comes in contact with will tell her numerous times, so you don’t forget.

2. P-L-E-A-S-U-R-E. Noni Blake is seeking pleasure. Unfortunately, Noni Blake’s idea of pleasure is a crap-ton of alcohol and casual sex with men and women from her past, as well as random one-night-stands. Whatever floats your boat, I guess.

I really loved the beginning of this book. Noni is so fun, and there are many laugh-out-loud funny moments throughout. Ironically though, once she sets about her pleasure quest, the whole POINT of the story, I began to lose interest. I was >>thisclose<< to DNF’ing it, but I DNF’d my last book, and I just couldn’t do two in a row.

I loved the overall message of this book; do what makes YOU happy. Put yourself first and stop worrying about what other people think about you. If it makes you happy and feels right, DO IT. Other people’s opinions mean nothing in the grand scope of YOUR life.

I just felt that everything was a little too Rom-Com’y perfect for my taste, though. It reminded me of that movie, ‘Isn’t It Romantic’ with Rebel Wilson. Even Noni’s disappointments felt like they were there only to make her seem relatable. The magician, the Principal situation, getting caught with Molly in the pub bathroom at the EXACT wrong moment…it all felt forced.

And the fact that every single person Noni was attracted to also wanted to sleep with her is just plain unrealistic. That every single one of them told her over and over how beautiful she is felt contrived. Like we were being beaten over the head with the message that ‘Bodyweight does not make a person beautiful!! Overweight people can be beautiful too!! Beauty is not about your dress size!!’.

Yeah, I know that. Thanks. But Noni had to be constantly reassured (and was), which just doesn’t happen IRL.

The ending was predictable yet satisfying. I was happy she went with her heart and did what made her happy, even if the entire end scene was another over-the-top Rom-Com’esq scenario of ‘I can’t believe this is happening. Can this situation get ANY worse? This isn’t the way it was supposed to go. What do I dooooo?’

In short, this wasn’t a terrible read, but I didn’t love it. A lot of laughing mixed equally with a lot of eye-rolling. This was a very good reminder to myself why I avoid Chick Lit like the plague. Definitely won’t be making that mistake again any time soon.

Such a beautiful story about a woman stuck in her life & trying to find happiness. I hope to bring a bit of Noni into my own life.

I did not care for this. The sex and language didnt bother me; I thought the writing poor and sophomoric.

I enjoyed this book so much that I ordered it for a friend!

This story has a lot of humorous moments and there were a couple of times where I laughed out loudly at the conversations between Noni and her close friends. I was drawn to this story because Noni is a bisexual woman who wants to give herself the love and care that she has been giving to everyone else. I also liked the fact that this story has other LGBTQIA characters and the story wasn’t mainly about being queer and this story deals with body positivity. Plus, the book cover is beautiful!

Despite all of those wonderful things, there were parts of this story that rubbed me the wrong way because I didn’t like the way Noni treated the firefighter and her other casual hook-ups. I can’t get over the fact that she slept with the firefighter and she didn’t even bother to remember her name and what’s worse is the fact that she just brushed off the whole encounter as though it was meaningless to her. Yes, she wants to give herself the love she so rightly deserves but at the end of the day, I felt as though Noni was only focused on how many people she could sleep with and I really had a hard time with relating to her struggles.

Self-love and going on a pleasure journey has nothing to do with how desirable someone is or how many people they can sleep with so that’s why I am disappointed with the way this story was told. I wish the author had given me more of Noni working on herself and building her confidence and more background on Noni’s relationship with her parents because I would have had a better idea of what triggered her self-doubts and I would have been able to truly connect with Noni.

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