Some insightful and thought provoking accounts of the trials and tribulations of differing friendships. There are detailed accounts of push and pull factors of friendships, as well as the weighing up of why we engage in different friendships throughout different stages of our life. Although there were parts of the book that resonated personally with me, I did find that I skim read many parts as they became repetitive and were a little labouring in making the point needed. This is not my normal choice of read but I am sure others would enjoy it more than I did.

Friendaholic is a dazzling reminder of why books matter so much. They matter because they remind us we're not alone, and that the struggles we may be going through, or the feelings we experience, are shared by others.

With unflinching honesty, the author self-reflects on the nature of friendship - and her need for acceptance. The pandemic was a time of evaluation for so many as it forced us to stop spinning the plates, and consider what really matters.

Day realizes that she has a deep seated need to be adored, and this has led to her becoming in her own words, a friendaholic. And so she sets out to look back at those she has known, and those she has lost. She looks inward and bears responsibility for her failure to be authentically herself with some of those people she considered friends. And understands that some of those were not truly friendships.

I felt as though I could have been reading about myself. And I do think as you learn and accept yourself wholeheartedly, your circle becomes smaller and more discerning.

The book looks at what constitutes a healthy friendship, and perhaps how to detach from those that leave you feeling drained and icky. It's also interspersed with interviews with friends who give their own definition of friendship.

A beautiful quote from the book states that 'a true friendship is a raft in the ever changing waters of life' and I think this sums it up. Friends are more than family for many of us and when you find your person it's a love that truly feels like home.

I was attracted to this book as I read Magpie, a domestic thriller written by the same author and loved it and her podcasts How to Fail and Best Friend Therapy are very entertaining so I had high expectations.

This is predominantly a memoir wrapped up as a popular psychology book but it does focus on friendship. At first it made me feel a bit of a sad sack as I don’t collect friendships like she does, well not anymore. As this book progressed and she shared some of the trauma she had put her self thorough with ex-friends ghosting her and frenemies it made me realize my unwillingness to over-effort myself to maintain relationships that aren’t going anywhere is healthy. This is certainly an revealing book for any author to write and she lays herself out bare, warts and all through her habit of collecting friends almost obsessively and for all the wrong reasons.

I thought the chapter dealing with the changing face of friendship through the child-rearing years, and the authors challenges with fertility insightful and the chapter about a friend’s battle with cancer was truly heart-wrenching.

The one aspect of this book that was lacking was any advice on how to form friends after our youth has passed, where the common ground of children and a hyper social life is a hazy memory, but she is only in her 40’s so I’m not sure what I was expecting.

Due to be posted on the 6th of April 2023
3.5 stars

What a great book and this covered lots of topics that no one really talks about - ending friendships when they are no longer giving you what you need.

I am a sucker for evidence to back up claims and this book was the right balance between her own personal experiences, others experiences and evidence from studies.

This is my first non-fiction book from Elizabeth Day and I am keen to seek out more.

Elizabeth - I'll be your friend however I live in Oxfordshire, not keen to meet up that often, whatsapp messages only and am up for riding a Peloton class with you online!

Firstly, huge thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for allowing me to read an advanced copy of this book.

When I first saw the synopsis for this book - I KNEW I had to read it. It sounded right up my street and I was absolutely right, I adored it!

In Friendaholic, the author unpacks the significance and evolution of friendship. From exploring her own personal friendships and the distinct importance of each of them in her life, to the unique and powerful insights of others across the globe, Elizabeth asks why there isn't a language that can express its crucial influence on our world.

This felt like such a therapeutic read to me, from the very first chapter I was highlighting passages of text because they just spoke to me. I loved how the book explores so many different memories with types of friendships, there are so many to be examined - never leaving the reader bored. All the chapters were wrapped up by small interviews which I really liked too!

Reading this book has made me understand better the reasons why someone might choose to let a friendship go, and helped me to further understand why I am justified in the decisions I make regarding some friendships.

Friendaholic is a warm and empathetic exploration of friendship and how to assess what it means to you to be a good friend. I will be recommending this one to everyone and anyone 💗

I enjoyed reading this, it was somehow lighthearted and also deep and helps to give understanding to situations that we’ve all been in with friends past and present, a great insight into how and why we do and say the things that we do.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for an advanced digital copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

What a great look at friendship throughout our life. When we are young quantity seems more important than the quality of true friends. As we get older we question more things. In times of crisis, like the pandemic, we find out who are true friends are. I no longer put up with things from my friends as life is too short. Valuing our true friends and protecting our own mental health is a big theme in this book.

Really enjoyed dipping in and out of this.
It was a good read but complicated for my weary brain. It was great to get the insights into why a) Elizabeth thinks the way she does and also b) why we have the friends we have.
Friends for a reason, friends for a season springs to mind.

Thank you to NetGalley and 4th Estate for sending me an e-copy for review :)

This book is honestly fantastic. I loved how it switched between various people’s stories, conversations between Elizabeth Day and various friends, and Day’s wide analysis of friendship from her personal life, media, and history.

So much of this book resonated deeply with me… I am indeed a friendaholic. Day describes the experience of chronic people pleasing with sensitivity which is perfectly balanced with great comedic timing, making the book an entertaining and engaging read that also inspires deeper self-reflection.

I must also add that I appreciated the inclusion of a variety of different voices. This allowed a diverse range of people to share their experiences and how these aspects of their life shaped their perspectives on friendship.


I genuinely think I could talk about this book forever, but I can’t eloquently put into words how strongly this book has made me feel seen. Thank you to Elizabeth Day for writing the book I didn’t know I needed.

As I was reading this book, already from the first pages of the book, all I could think of was – wow, a kindred spirit! As I kept reading it, I kept feeling more and more thankful that this book has reached me and that has happened right now. Talk about things happening at the right time!
The book is the author’s own very personal journey through her life and her friendships, her own musings and insights, and her own introspection and retrospection. Deep. She goes really deep. And she is real. Loved it. Loved it so, so much. To add to things I loved about this book: many studies. Regarding friendships and all sorts of relationships. Lots of sciency talk about studies that have been carried out over time, and also the author’s own personal thoughts on each of those. And then, interviews with people. Real people.
I really wish there were more than 5 stars to rate this absolutely fabulous book. It deserves some special non-fiction category, but I’m not yet sure how that category should be labeled.
I was at 5% of this book when I realized that it is So Relatable. Every page of it is so relatable. Everything is so human. So alive. So real. So raw.
And here is my own personal insight from this book: I have been *kind of* struggling with friendships all of my life. And from the first pages of this book, it suddenly dawned on me what the real issue and the real struggle is and was and has been FOR ME PERSONALLY. I had never been able to put my finger on it. I just had a feeling of – of not being the right person for friendships, maybe. As being labeled too intense, too present, and too much. But this book showed me that my “issue” is and has always been that I do not treat “romantic” relationships and “friendship” relationships as something very much different. Love is love, be it a friend or a partner. At least for me. If I love someone, I go all in. Yet for *most* somehow this does not work. they assign me some lesser role in their lives and keep some sort of affection from me, as it is reserved For That Special Someone Only, even if they do not have any Special Someone at that time, they will keep me at arm’s length and tell me that This Is Only a Friendship, do not take it that serious. And now, just because of this book, I know what it is. Now I know what caused all my struggles. It is me living my life being a Friendaholic. One who thinks friendships matter. One who thinks that the people we love matter. No matter what relationship status label we put on them.

The basic premise of this book is that Day finds, during the pandemic lockdown, that her life is empty because she has lost her main interest and hobby, which for her is friendship. We quickly learn, though, that unlike most of us who missed our friends, best and otherwise, and made convoluted arrangements to get a glimpse of them during lockdown, Day has, because of difficult formative experiences in the main, over-stretched herself, taken on every friendship she can gather and failed to maintain boundaries, making herself pretty stressed and miserable as a result. She then examines friendship theories (there are decent footnotes), shares what she's learned about herself from her inner circle and interrogates her close friends about their friendship.

She creates most of the book out of intimate portrayals of her friendships, both successful and over, and it was this I had trouble with - I can only assume the ones who were current friends gave permission and saw the text pre-publication, but what about the others, and she makes no efforts to hide or blur their identities and it's easy to identify them, and I found this uncomfortable reading.

Also, Day's journey through infertility is covered in depth, which I wasn't expecting, and there's a really quite upsetting chapter about how destroyed she has been by this and how she is always damaged and reeling when friends get pregnant / appears to bitterly resent when relationships change a bit when friends have children and she has to go to them physically. While it's a personal narrative there is a sort of expectation that everyone in that situation feels the same, which feels damaging.

There are positives to the book. Although the piece on her friend who had to face a serious health issue and the re-evaluation of all her relationships felt a bit intrusive, it gave a useful report on how it feels to be the person in a friendship whose life has changed, and the chapter on the death of a friend, as well as the comments on the lack of accepted stages in friendships and the ignoring of the end of friendships as an important thing, are useful. Day makes a solid effort at representing diversity in the book, her mini-interviews on friendship covering older and younger people, LGBTQ+ and straight, and different ethnicities, as well as the friends she writes about in detail including a Black woman and a British Asian man.

This was the second quite personal, confessional book I've read in a row and I have to say that this overstepped the mark into the personal for me, That and my issues with the infertility sections are undoubtedly down to me and my own situation and persona, and I'm sure lots of people will enjoy this book.

Rating rounded up to 3.5 stars

I enjoyed this book on the whole, however at times I felt myself drifting when I was reading the parts about different studies, unable to fully engage - there is every possibility that this was a me problem rather than any criticism of the content.

One thing that struck me strongly about this exploration of friendship was the commentary around there not being terminology to describe the platonic relationships we have, instead we borrow from romantic relationship terminology. From reading the way Elizabeth describes her many (and there are many...she's a self-confessed addict!) friendships, and from thinking about my own experiences, I'm not sure this is actually a problem. There are so many overlaps in the way we think and feel about our friends and romantic partners that it makes sense to use the same language. Some are fleeting, some everlasting. Some people are incredibly important to us at a particular point in our lives and then we can't understand why when we look back, and others are pined for in our quiet moments years after they have departed our circle. The bit that rung true more for me was that society doesn't see the breakdown of a friendship in the same way as the breakdown of a relationship - either we are supposed to just brush it off or let it limp along long after it's sell-by date because it's rude to not be someone's friend any more.

The way Elizabeth shared her own friendships, and really tried to look at what they meant to her/said about her were the more interesting bits of the book - I'm so happy she has an Emma, everyone should have one! I also enjoyed the small sections where other people described friendship.

The book is a fabulous take on platonic friendship – combining Elizabeth’s own anecdotal experiences, research into the topic, interviews with friends, and other essays on friendship. It therefore gives a well rounded view of the topic – although primarily looks at the author’s own experiences.

I found it really interesting – not least because I definitely also used to subscribe to the ‘quantity equalled quality’ belief. And also, like Elizabeth, found the Covid pandemic and personal traumas (for Elizabeth her fertility journey, and for me a child with a chronic health condition) put some ‘friendships’ into question.

I enjoyed the references from a plethora of different sources – including ancient texts (my son is applying to do Classics as as degree, so I have a new found interest in ancient history from various University open days) and more recent research – which made the book feel ‘deeper’ than solely a memoir. One fact that stuck with me is that on average people change half of their friends every 7 years (something personally evidenced for me by considering the guest list for my 50th next year compared to my 40th nine years ago).

The chapter on Elizabeth’s quest to have a biological child was really moving (and was also published in The Times) and helpful about what to say – and not to say – to a friend in similar circumstances, or to be honest, any childless woman you talk to. Despite having 4 children myself – I really hope I’m not a tw*t when talking to people without children – but it did make me check my own fertility privilege.

Having listened to Elizabeth and her best friend Emma on their joint podcast ‘Best Friend Therapy’ – I really felt I could ‘hear’ their voices in the chapter where they discuss friendship together – and what a wonderful friendship they have.

As a whole, the book has really made me evaluate my current – and historic – friendships, and feel less ‘guilty’ for friends I have drifted apart from. As Elizabeth says, why should we expect friendships to be ‘forever’ – some are for different times in your life, and that’s fine – and you can remember them fondly without considering them a failure (bringing in the old ‘How To Fail’ strand of Elizabeth’s career as well!)

A lovely non fiction book – that I’d recommend to all of my friends (and ex friends, and frenemies, and social media only friends etc etc!!)

Many thanks to NetGalley, the publisher and Elizabeth for my ARC. It’s out TODAY (30 March 2023)

@currentlyreading_
Book 22 of 2023

Thank you to @NetGalley, @4thestatebooks and the author @elizabday for the advance copy of Elizabeth's new book 'Friendaholic'. I have waited until publication day to post this review so readers can immediately purchase as it's such a profound
and cathartic book with the warmth and emotion we all associate with Elizabeth's
previous non-fiction and her hugely popular podcast How to Fail.

The book starts with Elizabeth's experience of collecting friends from every corner of her life and how she was in her words a 'friendship addict'. Her experiences are balanced with case studies, philosophy and evidence-based research and I loved the inclusion of Cicero and his 'How to be a Friend' written in 44 BC as well as a peppering of good old Aristotle.


Elizabeth's experience is hugely different to my own outlook on friendship, and as
someone with a small circle of close friends and admittedly a bit of a loner, I thought that the book would be full of glittering social engagements, hen nights and girls trips (without sounding like a curmudgeon, all of which fill me with dread). But it was relatable, beautifully written and above all, truthful.

As I am the same age as Elizabeth, I really enjoyed the chapter where she recounts
learning of "cyberspace" and the "information superhighway" and I am agreement that the terminology indeed seems "quaint". Statistics on the explosion of social media were thought-provoking as well the sociological and psychological studies on online connections.

From topics such as bread-crumbing, toxic friendships, ghosting, the impact of
COVID and support networks when dealing with illness and loss, this is the book for anyone who loves a truthful and candid read whilst wanting to consider their own experiences.

#bookstagram #bibliophile #bookworm #book #booknerd #bookstagrammer #kindle
#instabook #reader #bookobsessed #instareads #friendaholic #elizabethday
#fourthestatebooks

They say that it's only when you are going through a crisis that you find out who your real friends are, but like most people in the last few years, it took a global pandemic for me to really get to know who these people were. These are the people who I arranged to meet over Zoom for the weekly quiz, or the online Friday night after work drinks - or, once the lockdown restrictions began to ease, who I would venture out of the house to meet on park benches for a chat over a takeaway coffee. The friends who would be there to share the fears, frustrations - boredom! But also the laughs, the celebrations and wisdom of putting the world to rights.

Elizabeth Day covers all this and more in Friendaholic: Confessions of a Friendship Addict. Day freely admits that she has always been in pursuit of proving herself a Good Friend, even though that has sometimes come at an emotional cost. What does it mean to be a Good Friend? How can we be a Best Friend? Have we ever been <shudder> a Bad Friend?

From interviews with her own friends to sharing experiences of friendship from a range of ages, backgrounds and cultures, friendship in all its forms are explored in this book.

The chapter on Ghosting really hit home for me. I was 'ghosted' by someone I thought was my (platonic) soulmate a few years ago. To be honest, I'm still not 'over it' and I don't know if I ever will be without knowing why my friend decided to drop me from her life. Reading this book has made me understand better the reasons why someone might choose to let a friendship go, and learning about Day's own experience at being ghosted somehow made me feel a bit better about it! I think it's because of her generous and compassionate way of looking at situations, which fans of her 'How to Fail' podcast will recognise.

This book on the different kinds of friendships has made me think about the ways that friendship has been represented in the fiction that I have read recently. An example of 'Frenemies' in One Day I Shall Astonish the World by Nina Stibbe. Soulmate friendship that ends because one of the pair dies in We All Want Impossible Things. Platonic friendship between a man and a woman in Still Life (Ulysses and Evelyn!).

A warm and empathetic exploration of friendship and how to assess what it means to you to be a Good Friend.

This was a change from the other books I've read recently, Friendaholic is a series of essays about some of the successful and unsuccessful friendship's of the author Elizabeth Day What I really liked was at the end of each essay was a short pieces of another friendship of someone other than the author and that helped to break the book down.

I think, for me, what would've been interesting to see was in those broken friendships the other side of the story - but appreciate they would be hard to get that!

I did recognise some similar situation to ones I've been in over the years and I was really happy that we were close in age so could relate to the stories in terms of length of friendships. And having enough time passed to look back and reflect.

Because the book was split I found that I could read a couple of chapters, move on to another book and then come back to it and I really enjoy essay books for this.

I don't think I've read any of Elizabeth's fiction before but will definitely seek it out.

I love Elizabeth Day's fiction writing but this is her first non fiction work I have read.
Friendaholic is really well written but it didn't capture my full attention. I guess with books like these they either resonate with you or they don't.
If you are looking to explore friendships, how they work and how to get the most from them this would be a great read for you.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for allowing me to read Friendaholics.

An interesting read about friendships.
It’s easy to read, well written, engaging and thought provoking. I liked the style of writing and anecdotes.
It made me think about my own friendships.
Thanks to NetGallery and 4th Estate for an arc of Friendaholic in exchange for a honest review.

Friendaholic is not the sort of book I would normally read but on reading the description I could empathise with it and after finishing it I have definitely started to re-evaluate my friendships.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for my ARC.

Elizabeth Day has a kind and empathetic voice, which is at its best here. In the style of 'How to fail,' this is a warm and cosy journey through friendships - warts and all. Like all good non-fiction, it can be dipped into repeatedly. I defy anyone not to identify at least one of the friendships outlined, and equally, I wonder if anyone could read this and not be transported back to reflect on their own friendship journey. In the hands of a less empathetic writer, this could appear a contrived concept, but Day's empathy and kindness shine through.

A beautiful read - I wish I was Elizabeth's friend!

Thank you, NetGalley, for the ARC