Oh, Derrick McClain, you hit a home run with this one. As long as you can tolerate the occasional long stretches where every line of dialogue ends with '… (name) said,' you'll be golden. The only critique I'd give is the overuse of the word 'said'.

This is a lovely listen, and I highly recommend it.

I'm not sure whether Gus was written to be autistic-coded, but as an autistic adult I can safely say that he's the closest a character has ever gotten to my own personal flavour of neurodivergent oddity, and I love him for it. Never before have I related to a character so much. One of the biggest draws for me that keeps me coming back to this book is Gus. On my first listen, I quickly learned not to listen to this audiobook in public - there are entire chapters that still make me cackle even to this day. Furthermore, the comedy just speaks to me. As a non-straight asexual, I'm overjoyed by the representation in this book, and I find it to be very accurate to my own experiences as an abnormal, weird, and strange asexual in a non-straight relationship. To me, there's never been a book so easy to love. What a vibrant little fictional town Abby is, and what a heartwarming and cozy love story takes place within it. This book ticks every box for me, from the good representation, characters, story, and pacing, to the delightful subversion of a particularly tedious plot cliché at the climax of the story. Let me start by saying that I absolutely love this audiobook, and I listen to it more often than most would consider healthy - in other words, it's my comfort book. Hilarious, heartwarming, and hard not to love!

How to be a normal person by tj klune