This is a beautiful moving debut. This was written so well. It was multi layered with well developed characters. It made me cry.
A brilliant book

I found this really difficult to read having recently gone through a bereavement. Genuinely what an incredible, heart-wrenching book though. The author really gets the tough to tackle elements of this book spot on, grief, suicide, sexual assault etc. Not an easy read whatsoever but a very well-written and thought-provoking one.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for the ARC in return for an honest review.

Eve is a struggling 26-year-old with a dead end job and a tricky living situation, she starts finding herself struggling with delayed grief over her friend's death in college. Soon Eve loses her job, and finds a new gig as a life model. But as her mental health spirals, Eve begins to lose control of reality and things get darker.

This is definitely something I'd classify as 'sad girl fiction' with a story following a millennial young woman struggling with the expectations of life, the death of her friend and her father's alcoholism. I did enjoy following Eve go about her life, though at times it was hard watching her spiral and things getting worse and worse for her. I liked the writing style, and there were times the emotions and feelings of the story were so strong, I felt for Eve so much. She is a character who is very much alone in the world - her family consists of a dead-beat dad, her relationship with her flatmates who are like a family crumbles during the course of the story and then she has her maybe-boyfriend Max who thankfully is a really decent guy.

One of the problems I had with this book is the troubling way a sexual assault case is handled during the course of the novel. It's very clear a rape occurs on page - at least to the readers - and we see the character struggle with what has happened and blame herself but at no point during the rest of the story does she tell herself or others that what happened was wrong and it was rape. I would have liked this to have been explored more in terms of the character opening up about what had happened, acknowledging it wasn't her fault and the perpetrator getting some kind of punishment for what he did - none of which happens which I felt very disappointed in,

So I've read that this book contains a lot of trigger warnings and with my mental health the way it is at the moment I don't think it would be sensible for me to even attempt reading this book right now.

I'm so so sorry and so thankful that I was given the opportunity to read this one.

This was a difficult at times book to read as I was also grieving at the same time; what could have been hard was actually written with an honesty and wit and I was able to empathise with a lot of the novel. I followed Eve's story as she struggled but ultimately that she had hope; an honest and engaging novel.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for a copy of the novel in exchange for an honest review

Thanks so much to Orion for letting me read Wet Paint! I hate the category of 'sad girl reads' because it's completely meaningless – literally every definition I've seen just describes... a novel – but the people are right, Wet Paint is about a very, very sad girl. Eve is twenty-six and severely struggling – her best friend Grace died five years ago, she's working dead-end jobs she hates, she has no family support system, and she keeps indulging in self-destructive behaviour.

I found this an incredibly stressful read. Eve makes poor decision after poor decision, and by the time I was halfway through the book, I found myself skipping ahead to skim read the next few chapters, just so I could be emotionally and mentally prepared for what was coming. But at the same time, the poor decisions don't feel gratituous, like so many of these so-called 'disaster women' novels. I could feel Eve's pain, I could understand why she was doing what she was doing, and I could empathise with her mental state. Chloe Ashby does a great job of resisting overanalysis of Eve's mental condition, something that I always find a bit wearying in books of this ilk. I liked the biting humour in this too, and the intrusiveness of her memories of Grace; it felt like a more authentic version of the disaster women trope.

I was craving a bit more, though. I wanted more of Eve's history with Max, more about what actually happened with Grace, a bit less of a tidied-up ending. In short: I'd recommend this, but it's not a new favourite. I like my books much less anxiety-inducing!!

Wet Paint is an absolutely brilliant read and I will be thinking about Eve for a long time. Eve has had more than her fair share to deal with, from having her mother leave when she was only five, to the death of her best friend at university. Although her father is still alive and living nearby, he is unable to be any kind of supportive figure so she is pretty much on her own. Eve’s life is fairly chaotic – she seems to lurch aimlessly from one job to the next without a real plan for her future. Her living arrangements are slightly unconventional, living with a couple who reduce her rent in exchange for some sporadic housekeeping duties.

Eve really struggles to process the events of her past and it frequently seems to push her into making decisions which sabotage the good decisions and relationships she builds up. However she also seems to find herself in situations where the “right” actions aren’t always the “correct” ones and she can’t do right for doing wrong. I really liked her as a character and so desperately willed her to succeed and be able to address the issues holding her back. I think there are a lot of elements which will be relatable to anyone who has lost important or loved ones in their past, not necessarily just as a young person.

I really liked Chloë’s writing style. It was very easy to get into the story and care about Eve. There are sufficient peripheral characters to keep the story moving but without overwhelming the reader with too many to remember. There are a few sections which might need to come with a bit of a trigger warning – these are of a sexual nature and could be upsetting. However I felt they were written quite sensitively and not gratuitously. There are a lot of references to art within the story and I have ended up on a bit of a Google spree and learned quite a lot after looking up some of these pieces and artists!

I am a massive fan of Wet Paint and I hope it will be loved by readers.

REVIEW: Wet Paint by Chloe Ashby

Since the death of her best friend Grace, 26-year-old Eve has been struggling and keeping everyone at arm’s length. She gets by, by waiting tables and cleaning her shared flat in exchange for cheaper rent. A chance encounter at work ruins her routines and comforts; she loses her job, gets thrown out of her flat and the memories of Grace are painful. She takes up life-modelling to help pay the bills.

This was a great debut novel. If you’re a fan of the twenty-something year old woman who is struggling with life, like I am, then this is one for you to pick up. Eve is in survival mode rather than trying to flourish. She finds it hard to connect with people, even though she really likes Max, someone she has known since school and is still in touch with. Even though she is finding it hard to make connections, Eve is a people pleaser. She spreads herself a bit too thin.

I really liked the way that grief and trauma was presented in this book. Slowly it gets revealed to us what happened to her friend Grace. Eve is also dealing with feelings and trauma surrounding her mother that left her when she was a child and her dad who is an alcoholic. Weekly she goes to visit a painting in a gallery which was a painting that was special to her and Grace’s friendship and when this routine is threatened, she is in despair.

It was not an easy read. We watch a young woman, who you grow to care deeply for, even when she doesn’t care for herself and she makes some questionable decisions, really struggling with life and their experiences. You are able to see all these people who care for her and want to help her, but we have to wait for Eve to want help.

Overall, a dark but compelling read which I recommend.

Eve, an artistic twentysomething, is floundering through her life in London. She hates her job, has no money, no partner and is estranged from her alcoholic father. She’s trying to make sense of her trauma and grief - her best friend died and her mother abandoned her as a child. Her best tactic so far has been avoidance, but it’s not working. Her grief is visceral, her loss, heartbreaking.
Eve is a messy narrator but I liked her voice: vulnerable, funny, lost and a bit dangerous. Echoes of Fleabag.
I liked all the art-talk, especially her weekly therapy visits to see Suzon, the barmaid in Manet’s A Bar at the Folies-Bergere at the Courtauld Gallery. By chance, I read the book a week after visiting the gallery, so was very familiar with the art described.
Wet Paint is well written with real characters. I enjoyed it.
Many thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for the ARC. All views are my own.

I am still not sick of novels about messy young women. I’m not sure if I ever will be.

Eve is a messy young woman. She loses her bar job after an altercation with a customer who assaults her and decides to become a life drawing model. Her mum left when she was young, her dad is an alcoholic and she lives in a flat share with a couple.

Eve’s story is intercut with flashbacks to her friendship with her friend, Grace, who we know has recently died and Eve hasn’t dealt with her grief.

I enjoyed this a lot. I just wanted a bit more. I wanted more about Eve and Grace, more about her relationship with Annie who she meets in life drawing. There’s also a dark moment which I wish had been addressed more.

A lot of people are sick of thing kind of book. Fortunately I’m not.

4 stars

Eve is haunted by the death of her best friend Grace. She was devastated at the time and is not doing well. She shares a house with a couple who have kindly took her in for reduced rent as she also cleans for them. She also steals from them, but that's by the by. She gets by as a waitress. Well, until early in the book when she refuses to put up with a customer's advances. The rest of her life is spent "talking to" a picture. A painting that hangs in a nearby gallery. One whose subject she finds easy to talk to, to tell her secrets to, to offload to.
Now though, without a job, she needs money. Which she finds in the form of being a life model for artists. A strange job, taking off your clothes in front of stranger for them to draw/paint. But one that doesn't appear to faze her.
And then something happens that she loses her home. She is then rejected by her father and seeks solace with her one true friend.
But all this does is keep her ticking over. She has still not dealt with Grace's death and her feelings around that. All she is doing is burying them. But they are still there and threatening to overwhelm.. This book charts her spiral into and flight out of those feelings...
It's only a relatively short book but it definitely packs a punch. It helped that I took to Eve right from the start. I'm always a sucker for a wounded character. I just want to wrap my arms round her and save her. Rooting for her all the way through. She's naive and broken but there's still that spark, it just needs something to catch to.
Other characters were just as well drawn, Well it's a character driven book so you'd expect that to be the case for it to work. And the story they enact, well, all the feels in the world pretty much.
All in all, a cracking read that just makes me want to read more by the author. But... blow me down, it's a debut and she has no others for me yet. I say yet, I'm waiting with baited breath to see what she has in store for next time.
My thanks go to the Publisher and Netgalley for the chance to read this book.

Eve is 26, living a half life while she grieves for her best friend who died a few years ago. Estranged from her alcoholic father, living with friends in a flat she can barely afford and doing a job she hates. A chance encounter with her friend’s parents sends her life spiralling out of control and whatever grip she had is rapidly loosening.
This is an incredibly well written book and totally absorbing at times. However, Eve is so hard to like and emphasise with. She steals from anyone and everyone, and I never felt I understood why. It’s quite a struggle to believe that her boyfriend puts up with her and her behaviour. It’s terribly intense in places, I found myself holding my breath as I was convinced she was going to do something really dreadful.
At times it felt like Fleabag without the humour and archness, unrelenting in Eve’s misery and inability to connect with the world. I think some levity at times might have made it an easier book to enjoy rather than admire.
Thank you to #netgalley and #orionbooks for allowing me to review this ARC

This is one of these books that is well written but not much happens in. Eve is a nude model for an art class who is grieving the loss of her best friend. It's a quick read but I didn't connect to any of the characters and found it a bit of a chore.

I personally didn't really enjoy this book. Eve's character and story are interesting, but nothing much happens in the book and the characters (and plot line) are not really very believable. It would have been interesting to hear more about her friendship with Grace, and their closeness.

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/4499611869

There's much to recommend about this debut. Ashby takes a now-familiar path for young (female) authors in pushing into the emotional undertow of a deeply trauma and its fallout. In this case, it was done with an element of 'reveal' that didn't really serve the narrative and some of the characters - including Eve's endlessly patient boyfriend - were a little underdeveloped. Overall, however, there is a tenderness shown to her protagonist by the author that pulls the reader through it with sympathy and grace.

Eve has lost her mother when she left the 5-year-old and her father and never made contact again. Even though she somehow managed to cope with this experience, losing her best friend Grace totally throws her off the track. At 26, she is waiting in a bar despite having studied art at Oxford. Yet, she does not keep that job for long, just like any other job or the flat she shares. Nothing seems to linger in her life except for the painting she visits over and over again in a London museum and Max, a teenage friend. But even for Max it becomes increasingly harder to see how Eve throws away her life and does not accept any help.

Chloë Ashby’s debut novel brilliantly captures the protagonist’s being lost in the world after the death of a beloved friend that she has never gotten over. “Wet Paint” shows a young woman in survival mode who is far from unleashing her potential as she is straying in her life without aim or goal, from time to time colliding with reality but more often lost in thought and locked away in herself.

Eve is incapable of good relationships as she is far from being at ease with herself. Connecting with other people, being honest and really caring for them is impossible for her in state she is in. The only other being she shows real affection for is the young girl she babysits, but here, too, she is too lost in her thoughts and puts herself and the girl in danger.

The only constant in her life is a painting she observes closely and which calms her. Just the thought of the museum closing for a holiday makes her get nervous and when the museum loans her beloved pieces of art to another one, she almost freaks out, losing the last straw in her life.

It is not easy to watch how a young woman, lovable despite the way she treats others, is going down the abyss, yet, you can only help those that want to be helped. That’s what some characters also experience, they really care for her but can’t do anything to as long as she refuses to acknowledge her situation and to take necessary measures to improve her situation.

Not an easy read but in my opinion an authentic representation of the protagonist’s state of emergency.

I wasn’t a huge fan of this.I appreciated the character development of the protagonist, but I struggled to connect with her or the plot. I found that I was bored in some places and confused by the turn of events in others. But I appreciate the opportunity to access this ARC. Thank you to the publisher.

Relatable, contemporary, timely; Ashby's "Wet Paint" definitely has a Sally Rooney-esque quality about it, whilst at the same time possessing a distinctive voice.

http://www.hazelbutterfield.com/blog/2022/jan/reading-is-to-the-mind-what-exercise-is-to-the-body-joseph-addison/

Wet Paint – Chloe Ashby

There is only so long that we can proceed aimlessly in our lives after experiencing trauma and being let down, not addressing how life is sending us wayward in an effort to deny reality. The British trope of ‘Keep Calm and Carry On’, being upgraded to ‘If I Keep you at arm’s length – you can’t hurt me’. Wet Paint follows the journey of 26 year old Eve stumbling her way through life, unconsciously self-sabotaging everything available to her because, well, we accept a love we think we deserve. Right?

A fantastically written and enthralling debut from Chloe Ashby.

I really enjoyed the main character's obsession and dialogue with a painting as well as her relentless inner turmoil. Eve is a troubled soul and although we can guess why, we aren't given enough of an insight into the relationship she is grieving for. I would have liked to have known more about Grace. I had a lot of compassion for Eve but she was a difficult person to like. She's dishonest and sloppy with other people's lives and possessions and we learn this is down to her own troubled childhood. She really needs help though, she's been through so much and the odd behaviour played out in this novel is hard to digest. It's a good read, I finished the story and it did stay with me for a few days. There are so many broken people who walk among us and by reading this book I am reminded once again to be kind.