It's Not PMS, It's You

Written by Rich Amooi

Narrated by Carly Robins

Ruth "Ruthless" Harper is on the verge of becoming managing partner at her all-male consulting firm and she won't let anything stand in her way. That includes men, relationships, and that dreaded F word, feelings-distractions she eliminated long ago.

After the worst day ever (a near-death experience and a public wedgie, for starters), Ruth realizes she doesn't want to live and die alone. She puts together a business plan to find the perfect man and dives head first into the murky online dating pool. All she wants is a high-powered executive who understands how important her career is. If only it were that easy.

Problem is most men are intimidated by Ruth's confidence and shocked by her bluntness. The exception being her landscape designer, Nick, whose cool demeanor and unsolicited dating advice are driving her nuts. He's the antithesis of the business-oriented man Ruth envisions for herself, so why do all signs keep pointing back to him?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tantor Media, Inc
• Release date: May 12, 2020
• ISBN: 9781705209486

Reviews for It's Not PMS, It's You

[Shrimp Perator · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

It's not terrible, but it's not great either.

My main problem is with all of the characters: every single character is a stereotype of some sort, and the book refuses subtlety like it's a sport. She's the most stereotypical ice queen female power fantasy you could imagine, he's the stereotypical spiritual yoga dude (seriously, that's all his character is). Then there are some of the characters she goes on dates with, all of whom are so incredibly over the top insane it's just not believable anymore. And let's quickly mention her stereotypical evil bosses/coworkers: there are literally parts of the book where they discuss how much money they make and how one of them wants to buy a new jag - subtlety? No thank you. I appreciate a well conceptualized bad guy as much as the next person, but being evil is not a sufficient character trait - the characters need a bit more motivation than: "I like being an evil corporate antagonist and I love money!" A well thought out bad guy makes you go: "I don't agree with you, but I understand where you're coming from". But with characters like clinically insane Bagel-Barry, her darth-vader-esque work colleagues ("would you please literally fire your boyfriend's cousin so we make some more money? What, I am so surprised you don't want to do that, you should take a vacation!" Seriously, that's not how people work, even evil ones), I just can't take any of the characters seriously.

The entire plotline of her going on dates was a waste of time in my opinion, because none of the guys was ever an option, because they were all such over the top laughable and unrealistic stereotypes of bad dates, there's just nothing interesting happening here, and it doesn't produce any conflict: you already know beforehand, you're getting another insane character again. Watching stereotypes play out is only interesting for so long (if that), I would appreciate being surprised a lot more instead. A character who owns a toilet-shaped store, is called Butts for his last name and has a fetish for toilets is not interesting or believable - it's too much, and it lacks subtlety.

Wouldn't be so bad if I didn't hate the male love interest so much. He's incredibly smug, judgy, childish (he has to get what he wants immediately or he starts whining) and has no redeeming quality other than being secretly rich and a good old dose of magical instant love: one of the cheapest of romantic plot elements. Being a calm yoga dude gets really annoying if you're constantly calm and smug at the wrong moments. I would've appreciated him as an antagonist though, because I hate him so incredibly much. He's like that "friend" you have, who read a few self help books and now is so insanely sure of himself, despite acting like a complete douche. He also refuses to make sacrifices, except for his money (of course he is rich, because why should there be any conflict?) and refuses to be wrong about anything by, again, acting smug (yes, it gets old very fast). His character in a nutshell: "Oh, I don't mind you working much if it makes you happy, but I'm still going to judge you for it by acting superior!"

But apparently there's magical instant love, so who cares? There's literally a secondary plotline with the best friend telling the protagonist how she is going to marry that dude she saw twice because they instantly fell in love. It's cheap in my opinion: magical instant love is a cheap way of avoiding character development and thinking about developing interpersonal relations. Because as an author, why think through how actions would affect other characters and the world around them, if they magically stay in love anyways?

The narrator has a great voice, but her intonation is wrong on so many sentences, getting me more and more irritated over time. She commonly and constantly stresses the wrong words/syllables :(

[Justine Faerber · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Funny & heartwarming at the same time loved it highly recommend

[SerendipityReads · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Rich Amooi can always be counted on for really original storylines and characters, and I feel like this was no exception. However, I have to agree with the other reviewer who said that every single character was so darn one dimensional. But I get it, the next Great American Novel was never the goal here, and the waaaaay over the top dates were supposed to be funny (and even were, sometimes. :p )

But it was just really hard to form a connection with ANY of the characters....even the dog, and it's sometimes it's Mr. Amooi's pets who save the entire book. :p

I listened to the audio version, which was also just "eh". The narrater didn't change "voice" much between the MMC and FMC, and at times it was hard to know how was speaking.