Summer is coming to a close and many people are returning to work after holidays, so it seemed an apt time to tell you about 'I Hope This Finds You Well' by Natalie Sue.Another Day at the Office
Jolene is laying low in soul-sapping, dead-end admin job when she makes a mistake that will ultimately turn everyone's lives upside-down. To vent her frustrations at cold and bullying colleagues, the prickly administrator hides snarky postscripts in white font in her emails - until one day she leaves the font black and her words are discovered. Hauled in front of management and the new HR lead, Cliff, Jolene is told she must complete sensitivity training to keep her job. To add to the humiliation, she's marched back to her desk and Cliff uploads monitoring software onto her computer. But something goes wrong. A technical glitch gives her access to her co-workers’ private messages. Suddenly she's not only able to see what her colleagues really say about her, but clues to their own silent secrets and sorrows. Faced with a moral dilemma and a golden opportunity to save her job, Jolene must decide what she's going to do next.
A Union of Different Kinds
'I Hope This Finds You Well' is a highly entertaining yet poignant book that runs with the theme 'don't judge a book by its cover' and turns it into something thoughtful, relatable and sympathetic. It's funny and heart-breaking, and makes important points about why we should all look up from our computers once in a while and connect. In an age when the word 'anxiety' can feel overused, Jolene offers a helpful insight into what the condition actually means for sufferers and how it's harder than we think to just 'get over it'.
Colleagues and Co-workers
In some ways, 'I Hope This Finds You Well' reminded me of 'Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine', but in others I felt this was a better book. Jolene is a trapped by anxiety and ham-strung by the cruelty of others, but she is more relatable and sympathetic, despite her defensiveness. Jolene has power, agency and will that make you root for her from the start. I also liked the way this isn't just her story, that it's the story of a group of people with their own flaws and fears, all trying to make sense of where they are, how they got there, and how to make things better. Much like in real life and despite first impressions, there aren't any villains here (well, one), and the book says a lot about the value of taking the time to listen and understand. But maybe not by spying though!
Overall
I thoroughly recommend 'I Hope This Finds You Well'. I laughed, I cried, I got that warm, fuzzy feeling that only the best romantic comedies can provide. Who can ask for more?
'I Hope This Finds You Well' by Natalie Sue was published by The Borough Press, an imprint of HarperCollins, in 2025. This post is based on the ebook version. Cover image provided by the publisher and reproduced with their permission. Find out more and buy from the HarperCollins website.
