Lucy Green is about to have it all. The next day is her birthday, when she officially turns 30. She has a lunch meeting planned with a movie star, and if she can secure said star as a client, then Lucy will definitely be up for that promotion for senior publicist. And then there’s her party, at a hip rooftop bar over L.A., a perfect place should her boyfriend decide it’s finally time to propose. They already have plans to move in together. The day will be unforgettable.

But for now, it’s the night before, and Lucy is sitting at a bar waiting for her boyfriend Caleb to show up. They were supposed to be meeting for a drink, but Lucy is sitting there drinking her martini alone. When the hot bartender asks her about her drink, she tells him that it’s fine. But the expression on her face says something different. He offers her another drink, a specialty he created himself, and Lucy made a wish, a birthday wish for a perfect day, as she took her first sip. The drink was delicious, but the text from Caleb came soon after, sorry but he couldn’t get away from work. Lucy thanked the bartender and headed home, alone.

The next morning, Lucy thought through all the things she needed to do that morning before her lunch meeting. She had spin class, then a light breakfast, a shower, and then getting dressed in a dress so tight she needed to wear compression undergarments under it, and her intricate make-up and hair style. But when her friend Nina showed up to go to spin class, Lucy just couldn’t find the motivation. Instead, she admitted that she hated spin class and wanted to go out for breakfast instead. As she inhaled a bagel sandwich with cheese and a runny egg, Lucy watched Nina eat her yogurt with blueberries and wondered why she usually ate almost nothing, spending all morning hungry, just waiting until she could grab her mid-morning snack of a handful of almonds.

Instead of her usual face full of makeup and blowout, Lucy let her hair dry into its natural waves and added only some tinted lip balm. She put on a sundress that was flowy and comfortable and flats instead of her usual tight dress and high heels. She couldn’t understand why she chose to be so uncomfortable so often. And after changing up her morning routine so much, she couldn’t believe how much time she was saving.

It’s not until se gets to work and sees how people are noticing her new look that Lucy realizes just how differently she’s acting. She feels free to be more herself, to speak her truest thoughts, but she also realizes that she can’t lie to anyone else either. As a publicist in Hollywood, that could be a liability. Especially when she gets called into the CEO’s office and he once again makes her feel uncomfortable, making suggestive hints about her future with the company but not coming out and crossing an obvious line. But Lucy’s inability to hold her tongue means that gets herself into hot water with him, putting her promotion and maybe even her job in jeopardy.

Lucy tries to figure out what happened to keep her from lying to herself and to others, and as she thinks back over what happened that may have changed her, she remembers the hot bartender and that drink he gave her the might before, the one he had called “life-changing.” Did he put truth serum in her drink? Or was it some kind of spell that is keeping her from being able to lie? Lucy needs to track him down and find out what happened. But when she does, and he shows her the ingredients he used to make her drink—no potions, no serums, some lemon—and makes her another drink so she can taste it again, Lucy realizes it much have been her wish for the perfect day that was keeping her from lying. And when she explains it to Hot Bartender, he wonders if it is a curse, or it it’s a blessing.

As Lucy goes about her crazy day—her lunch meeting, the fallout from her meeting with the CEO, a difficult discussion with her boyfriend, and a PR nightmare—she too starts to wonder if the truth telling is maybe the best thing she’s done. With all the things women do to lie to themselves, what if letting go of all those lies are the way to true happiness in life?

Nothing But the Truth is author Holly James’s look at the things we tell ourselves and how those things aren’t always honest or in our best interests. She takes a deep dive at the things women are taught as they’re growing up and chasing success and how that can change the way they think of themselves, change the way they react in situations, and limit their potential. I have seen it, I have done it, and I applaud Ms. James for tackling such a complicated part of modern life.

I enjoyed Nothing But the Truth. I liked Lucy a lot, at least the Lucy that appeared on her birthday, and I thought the story of her not being able to lie was clever and fun. There are a lot of likeable characters in this book, and a few that aren’t, and I had a lot of fun reading it. But after a while, this one day seemed endless. It didn’t seem possible for so many things to happen in one afternoon and it got increasingly difficult to suspend disbelief that so much happened so quickly. But aside from that, Nothing But the Truth is a sweet book about important things, and it will probably be a good book for a book club discussion or for a buddy read, especially if there are bubbly purple vodka drinks involved. With a little lemon. .

Egalleys for Nothing But the Truth were provided by Dutton through NetGalley, with many thanks.