Book Title: Life, Unscheduled
Author: Kristin Rockaway
Purchase: Amazon
Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Description from Goodreads:

A smart, modern novel about a woman trying to balance her career, her best friend, and falling in love without crashing and burning.

Nicole Palmieri is married to her job. As a user experience designer at Virtuality, an artificial intelligence company in Los Angeles, Nicole is at her desk from sunrise to sunset. She doesn’t have time for a social life (or a love life), but that’s perfectly fine with her. Until her best friend, Parisa Shahin, announces her engagement and asks Nicole to be her maid of honor.

That’s when Nicole decides to meticulously schedule out the next six months of her life—from her project due dates to her dress-fitting appointments to how many hours she plans to sleep each night. If she can stick to her schedule, she’ll balance everything fine. Of course, that’s a really big if. And after she crosses paths with emerging restaurateur Brandon Phelps, Nicole is feeling feelings she hasn’t felt in…well, ever. But scheduling time to fall in love might push even the most meticulous plans into pure chaos.

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars 

Another two-day read! This book hooked me because the main character is almost me—a user experience (UX) designer at a fast-paced tech company who hates conflict. Or really, she’s like a younger version of me, the one who wasn’t great at setting boundaries at work and constantly defended a toxic work environment. 

There’s a lot I like about this book simply due to the general accuracy of what it’s like being a UX designer. I’ve never seen my job represented in fiction like this. However, it’s also a very stressful read. I read it in two days back to back and it felt just like being at work on a really bad day. The main plot is that Nicole is gunning for a promotion at work so she takes the lead on a big, high-pressure project with a tight deadline. In her nonexistent free time, she’s also balancing being Maid of Honor in her best friend Parisa’s wedding—a role that’s RIFE with conflict—and she’s just met a fantastic guy who sets her body on fire.

My heart squeezes every time Nicole justifies spending eighty hours a week at work or rationalizes only having work relationships outside of childhood friend Parisa’s friendship. Parisa often comments on Nicole’s workaholism—at the beginning of the novel, Nicole literally says she believes burn out is a myth (oh, the naïveté)—but Nicole and her coworkers tell themselves that only Virtuality employees get what it’s like to work for Virtuality. It sounds a lot like a cult. 

The romance is sweet and generally PG. It certainly doesn’t play a big role, but does serve as a catalyst for self-reflection and change on Nicole’s part. The love interest is hunky and perfect and of course he has a single overreaction out of nowhere that of course blows further out of proportion when neither character communicates with the other. Sigh. You know, usual rom-com stuff. It’s cute but it isn’t anything special.

The wedding plot line is much more interesting. Parisa’s people-pleasing compulsion is all too relatable and leads to a series of tricky situations for Nicole to navigate as MoH. I’m in awe of Nicole’s directness with Parisa’s overbearing family, especially as it involves facing her fear of conflict. There’s a bachelorette party complete with hijinks and surprises, as well as some tender moments. The friendship between Nicole and Parisa is full of support and open communication. They work through a fight and come out stronger on the other side.

Overall, Life, Unscheduled is a quick, enjoyable read. It isn’t life-altering and I probably won’t remember the details this time next year, but it’s a solid three-star read.