cover image What to Do When You Get Dumped

What to Do When You Get Dumped

Suzy Hopkins and Hallie Bateman. Bloomsbury, $24.99 (144p) ISBN 978-1-63973-189-3

Hopkins and her daughter, New Yorker cartoonist Bateman, follow up What to Do When I’m Gone with another heartfelt and witty mash-up of advice and memoir, this time on how to navigate romantic breakups. After her husband of 30 years leaves her for an old flame, Hopkins embarks on a journey of grief, rage, misery—and, eventually, healing. The countdown to “unbreak a heart” begins, she explains, when one emerges from the initial “toxic cloud.” From there, Hopkins offers a cathartic catalog of her own travails and a step-by-step instruction manual. Immediately after getting dumped, she advises, one should panic, take cover (hiding under a pile of blankets is an option), and climb aboard the “heartbreak express” to commune with fellow sufferers. But as time heals their wounds, the lovelorn can open back up by seeking beauty in the world, saying “yes” to new things, and ultimately finding a way to “forgive or forget.” Hopkins’s simple, vulnerable, and sometimes sarcastic instructions are accompanied by Bateman’s lightly humorous drawings, with scenes ranging from close-ups of women sobbing, to dishes piled up in a sink, a dog game show host on a wheel of outcomes, and a roller coaster labeled “brace yourself.” For any reader reeling from a split, this is a tender embrace from someone who’s been there. Agent: Kate McKean, Howard Morhaim Literary. (Jan.)