I Am Having So Much Fun Here Without You (Maum)

Book Reviews
A charming and engrossing portrait of one man's midlife mess.... Smart, fast-paced.... You come for the plot, but you stay for the characters—especially Maum's flawed but likable and basically well-intentioned hero. Ultimately, this is the story of a man who would do anything to be a better person, and you will avidly wish for him to succeed.
Elle


Courtney Maum bursts onto the scene with a hilarious and wise novel.... Richard Haddon is one of the more lovable male characters we've encountered this season.... You'll find yourself agog at Maum's masterful storytelling and dead-on descriptions.
Glamour


Courtney Maum kills it.
Vanity Fair


[An] affably comic take on husbandly comeuppance, Courtney Maum’s I Am Having So Much Fun Here Without You follows a once-sizzling British artist’s hilariously misguided efforts to win back the love of his wife.
Vogue


In Maum’s debut novel, it’s 2002, and as English artist Richard Haddon’s reputation swells...his marriage slowly crumbles.... These characters are complex, and their story reflects their confusion and desire. As her story bounces through time and across continents...Maum rarely loses focus. An impressive, smart novel.
Publishers Weekly


Richard Haddon should be celebrating.... Instead, he's feeling like a sellout. Anne has just discovered that Richard had been having an affair.... Maum carefully paints Richard and Anne's relationship, from its heady start, to Richard's infidelity, to his shaky attempts to repair the damage. A solid, well-written character-driven contemporary novel. —Christine Perkins, Whatcom County Lib. Syst., Bellingham, WA
Library Journal


Maum’s tale deftly captures a thirtysomething’s sense of grief for the lost passion of youth and the search for something of depth to take its place. Writing with an authentic and affecting vulnerability, Maum considers sentimentality from every possible angle—interpersonal relationships, lofty idealism, and art—and each receives an equally unflinching examination. An unapologetically thoughtful novel told without melodrama and with a lot of heart.
Booklist


Despite the clever title and intellectual-verging-on-pretentious characters—a sensitive British painter who wants his work to have meaning; his French lawyer wife who doesn't want him to sell out...—Maum's first novel is basically a romantic comedy for elitists.... The not-terribly-sharp humor is more enjoyable than the predictable plot shot through with sentimentality.
Kirkus Reviews