Breakups are essentially a form of temporary insanity. You’re fine one minute, then you’re standing in a Boots aisle spending £140 on bottles of perfume your ex used to wear just so you can smash them or throw them in a canal. It’s pathetic. It’s also exactly what Andy Dawson does in Dolly Alderton’s second novel.
Dolly Alderton Good Material isn't just another "sad boy" story, though it definitely starts that way. It’s a surgical examination of what happens when a thirty-something man gets dumped and realizes his entire personality was just a subsidized byproduct of his girlfriend’s existence.
Andy is 35. He's a stand-up comedian whose career is, let’s be honest, circling the drain. When Jen, his partner of four years, leaves him with a vague explanation that feels more like a riddle than a reason, he falls apart. But he doesn't just cry. He obsesses. He turns into a digital detective, stalking her Instagram and trying to "solve" the breakup like it’s a cold case file.
Why the Male Perspective Actually Works Here
Usually, when a female author tries to write from the perspective of a straight man, it can feel like a caricature. You get the "I thought about my truck and then I thought about beer" kind of prose. Alderton avoided that trap by interviewing fifteen real men about their heartbreaks before she even started writing.
The result? Andy feels painfully real.
He’s annoying. He's self-pitying. He moves into a room with an elderly conspiracy theorist named Morris because he can't afford London rent on a failing comic's salary. It’s grim.
But there’s a nuance here that most reviews miss. Alderton isn't just making fun of Andy. She’s showing how men often lack the "emotional vocabulary" that women develop through decades of intense, wine-fueled debriefs with friends. While Jen is surrounded by a support network that treats an emotion like a gem to be inspected under a microscope, Andy is struggling to even name what he’s feeling.
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He tries to fill the void with "good material" for his stand-up set. He thinks if he can just turn the pain into a punchline, it’ll be worth it. Spoiler: it rarely is.
The Jen Twist: A Masterclass in Narrative Subversion
For about 300 pages, we are trapped inside Andy’s head. We see Jen through his "rose-tinted" retrospect. She’s the one who got away. She’s perfect, mysterious, and slightly cruel for leaving him.
Then, the perspective shifts.
The final section of the book belongs to Jen. Honestly, it changes everything.
What most people get wrong about Dolly Alderton Good Material is thinking that the book is about Andy’s growth. It’s actually about the discrepancy between how we see a relationship and how it actually feels for the other person.
From Jen’s perspective, the relationship wasn't a tragedy—it was a cage. She describes Andy as an "intimacy junkie." She reveals that his "free-spirited" nature was actually just a lack of ambition that she had to subsidize with her own emotional labor.
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- Andy saw: A soulmate connection.
- Jen saw: A man-child she had to manage.
- Andy saw: A sudden, confusing exit.
- Jen saw: A slow, agonizing realization that she wanted to be alone.
Masculinity and the "Friendship Quota"
One of the best parts of the book is how it handles male friendship. Andy is terrified of being a burden. He literally sets a "Jen Quota" for himself, limiting how much he can talk about his ex to his best friend Avi.
It’s heartbreaking because Avi clearly cares, but the social scripts for men don't always allow for the kind of "ugly crying on a kitchen floor" support that women take for granted. Alderton captures the weird, silent solidarity of men. They help him move. They take him for pints. They don't always ask "how are you really," but they’re there.
There’s a specific scene where Andy goes on a houseboat to "find himself." It’s a disaster. It’s damp, it’s cold, and it’s a perfect metaphor for his internal state. He’s trying to perform the "brave single man" role, but he’s just a guy in a wet coat wondering why his life didn't turn out like a Richard Curtis movie.
Is It Better Than "Everything I Know About Love"?
Look, her memoir Everything I Know About Love is the millennial bible. It’s hard to top that. But Dolly Alderton Good Material shows a much more mature writer at work.
While her first novel Ghosts was a bit of a "dating app" satire, this feels deeper. It’s less about the "how" of dating and more about the "why" of staying. Or leaving.
It’s also genuinely funny. The descriptions of Andy’s failing comedy sets are cringey enough to make you want to close the book, but the dialogue—especially with Morris the conspiracy theorist—is gold.
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Actionable Insights for the Heartbroken
If you're reading this because you're currently in the "Perfume-Smashing" phase of a breakup, here are a few things Alderton’s book actually teaches us:
- The "Why" doesn't matter. Andy spends months trying to find the "reason" Jen left. When he finally gets it, it doesn't actually make him feel better. The closure is the departure, not the explanation.
- Stop the social media autopsy. Every time Andy checks Jen’s Instagram, he resets his healing clock to zero. You cannot heal in the same environment (or digital space) where you got sick.
- Your friends are tired, but they love you. It's okay to have a "quota," but don't isolate. The book proves that platonic love is the only thing that actually keeps the floor from falling out.
- Acknowledge your own "cringe." You are going to do embarrassing things. You might date a 23-year-old named Sophie (like Andy does) only to realize you have absolutely nothing in common. That’s fine. It’s all "good material" eventually.
The book ends in early 2020. There’s a bittersweet irony because the reader knows that while Jen is planning a solo trip to South America and Andy is prepping for the Edinburgh Fringe, a global pandemic is about to trap everyone in their own heads anyway.
Alderton doesn't give us a "happily ever after" where they get back together. She gives us something better: the realization that being alone isn't the same thing as being lonely. It's just a different way of being.
What to Do Next
If you haven't read it yet, grab a physical copy rather than an e-book. The formatting of Andy’s "Lists of Reasons Why She’s Bad for Me" and the text message threads work much better on the page.
If you’ve already finished it and you’re feeling that post-book void, listen to the Sentimental Garbage podcast episode where Alderton discusses the book’s themes of "masculinity and the rom-com." It provides a lot of context on why she chose to end the book from Jen’s perspective.
Finally, if you are struggling with a breakup right now, take a leaf out of Jen's book. Don't look for a person to save you. Look for a version of yourself that you actually like being alone with.
That’s the real "good material."
Next Steps: You should check out Alderton's "Dear Dolly" columns in The Sunday Times if you want to see how she applies this relationship logic to real-world problems. Many of the themes in the novel started as questions from her readers. For a similar vibe in fiction, Nick Hornby's High Fidelity is the obvious companion piece—it's the book Alderton was clearly tipping her hat to throughout Andy's downward spiral.