Lone Star Book Blog Tour (and Giveaway): The Theory of Happily Ever After

Our hilarious, smart and complicated protagonist, Dr. Maggie McGuire is the author a book called The Science of Bliss.  She is not a shrink – she is thoroughly a scientist, her book is researched and based on empirical data. We first meet her after a breakup with her fiancé, as she hiding out in her pitiful excuse for an apartment in grubby clothes, binge-watching sappy movies and binge-eating gelato – and apparently feeling like a fraud in light of her well researched and successful book.

This could have gone the way of all the usual breakup tales, but author Billerbeck doesn’t take the expected way of laying it all on the pathetic, traitorous boyfriend. She reveals,   gradually (as she works through her own issues, egged on by a fellow shipmate’s comment that smart girls aren’t capable of happiness), that Maggie and her issues are a whole lot more complicated than you might expect, and those reasons turn into a bit of an epiphany – for both Maggie, and maybe even for the reader.

If you’ve ever been through a bad breakup, Maggie’s character is thoroughly relatable in her misery. Honestly, the woman is a hot mess, and she owns it, and every bit of her crazy – and it all makes for a delightfully fun read.  She’s clumsy, self-deprecating at times and funny smart at others, fellow passengers on the boat enter her life and push her out of her comfort zone, and into revealing some pretty deep truths and closely held secrets.

There is a great balance here between the fun, the funny, awkwardness and grief, and the author does a wonderful job at making Maggie a fully human character and not a caricature.  Supporting characters are equally delightful, a bit maddening, and quite honestly, you may find yourself googling “cruise vacations” by the end of it all.  I was not expecting to find a light Christian element to the book, but it added to the complexity that is Maggie the scientist, and even if this isn’t your thing, do not let it dissuade you, because it fits into the storyline in its own way.

As  I mentioned above, while I couldn’t put this book down, I struggled to slow down my reading, since I had fallen in love with the characters and didn’t want the story to end. This is a book with a lot of heart and honesty. I highly recommend it if you are looking for a book with a little bit of everything.

Author Kristen Billerbeck has written more than thirty novels, and I don’t know how this could be my first encounter with her but it definitely won’t be my last.