Fleishman is in Trouble by Taffy Brodesser-Akner

From Goodreads

Recently separated Toby Fleishman is suddenly, somehow--and at age forty-one, short as ever--surrounded by women who want him: women who are self-actualized, women who are smart and interesting, women who don't mind his height, women who are eager to take him for a test drive with just the swipe of an app. Toby doesn't mind being used in this way; it's a welcome change from the thirteen years he spent as a married man, the thirteen years of emotional neglect and contempt he's just endured. Anthropologically speaking, it's like nothing he ever experienced before, particularly back in the 1990s, when he first began dating and became used to swimming in the murky waters of rejection.

But Toby's new life--liver specialist by day, kids every other weekend, rabid somewhat anonymous sex at night--is interrupted when his ex-wife suddenly disappears. Either on a vision quest or a nervous breakdown, Toby doesn't know--she won't answer his texts or calls.

Is Toby's ex, just angry like always? Is she punishing him, yet again, for not being the breadwinner she was? As he desperately searches for her while juggling his job and parenting their two unraveling children, Toby is forced to reckon with the real reasons his marriage fell apart, and to ask if the story he has been telling himself all the time is true.

My thoughts

I gave this a 3.5 stars or 7/10.  It was an unusually written book, in that there were no chapters at all.  The story was told in several parts and at times I found it hard going, but I wanted to know how it ended so I kept on reading.

I am not sure how I actually came across this book, whether it was the fact that I kept seeing it being mentioned or whether it was just a casual choice from my local Library.  To be fair that doesn't really matter, the fact is that I've read it and I am glad in some ways that I did, despite finding it hard going in places.

At times the story was quite sexually charged, I am not sure if this was intentional or not.  Toby Fleishman is not a likeable character at all, yet you do at times feel sorry for him in some ways.  This story is a sign of the times and the society that we live in.  Life is often so hectic and relationships are not always something that people are after.  Many are just after their needs being met and not always too bothered about who does this for them.  Their lives being lived through social media apps, etc. With little or no commitment towards others apart from the here and now.

I am glad that I picked this story up, would I recommend it to others? Yes, I think I would, as it's a great social depiction of modern life and society as we know it.