happy days are here again
Joy Moore grew up tired. For years, her parents took her to doctors, and they all said it was normal for her to be tired. But she was still struggling in school, falling asleep in class. It wasn’t until she was diagnosed with narcolepsy that she learned how to control her sleep schedule. But she still fell asleep in public, like when she went to a late concert and fell asleep on the floor. That’s where Benny Abbott found her, and that’s where their story started.
Joy hadn’t lived in L.A. very long, so she went to the concert to meet people. Benny found her sleeping on the floor and helped her out of the building, thinking she was drunk. From there they became friends, and then neighbors, and then podcast hosts.
The podcast was Benny’s idea. Each week, one of them would research a dangerous situation and the other person wouldn’t know in advance what the topic was. Their banter was electric, and with some celebrity endorsements and the good luck afforded them by their bust of Happy Days’ Fonzie, the podcast became incredibly popular almost immediately. Now it’s years later, and they’re in the process of negotiating a multi-million dollar deal with a top podcast network and working on a memoir, thanks in part to their producer Xander, Joy’s husband.
But when Benny shows up at Joy’s house one day to record their episode, he finds broken windows and no one home. He calls the police and they start investigating, but there is no sign of Joy or Xander. Benny snags her laptop before the police can find it, to see if he can find any clues that Joy may have left for him. And then he panics and makes a public announcement that Joy and Xander are missing, which results in the police tip lines being flooded with sightings from all over the world.
After several days with no news, Benny finally finds Joy’s part of the memoir, and as he reads, he discovers that there was a lot more going on with her than narcolepsy and podcasting. She had felt like she was being watched, and people close to her were keeping secrets. As Benny reads her words and starts to put together a bigger picture, he sees where the problem is, but he still doesn’t know where Joy is or if she’s okay. But the more time goes by, the more the police start looking in his direction, so Benny knows that he has to hurry in order to save the podcast, and more importantly, the life of his best friend.
This Story Might Save Your Life is a clever thriller, with breadcrumbs sprinkled in slowly as the character development drives the story. The story is told in part through clips from the podcast and Joy’s chapters of their memoir, so readers get different perspectives of the story as the bigger picture comes into focus. But the best part of this novel is the characters of Benny and Joy. Their friendship through the years, the way they connect to each other and make each other better, is the driving force of the narrative.
I listened to This Story Might Save Your Life on audio, narrated by Julia Whelan and Sean Patrick Hopkins. I have been a fan of Whelan for many years, so listening to her narrate a book is a treat for me. She was the voice of Joy, and Hopkins was the voice of Benny, and those moments where they were together and everything was clicking was absolute perfection. Their interactions were so lovely that I just wanted more of the two of them. If this podcast were really a thing, I would have gotten sucked into it too, because with these two narrators, it’s just that good. I got caught up in the mystery with this book, but these narrators took this smart thriller and elevated it to a must-listen. Everything about this audio book is a triumph.
An early copy of the audio book of This Story Might Save Your Life was provided by Macmillan Audio through NetGalley, with many thanks, but the opinions are mine.
