A Practical Guide to Reading the This Man Series
If you are looking to read This Man by Jodi Ellen Malpas, the straightforward part is finding it. It is widely available through Amazon Kindle, Audible, and most major ebook retailers. The longer part is figuring out what order to read the trilogy and whether the audiobook actually works for this series. The book was originally self-published in 2014 before being picked up by Grand Central Publishing. It became a bestseller largely through Word of Mouth on social media, not through traditional marketing. That matters because the writing style itself is rough around the edges. Malpas writes for a specific audience and she does not pretend otherwise.
Where to Find This Man Jodi Ellen Malpas
Kindle copies run roughly $3.99 to $5.99 depending on sales. Audible has the complete trilogy as an unabridged narration. The audiobook is performed by three different narrators across the three books, which is honestly one of the weaker production choices they made. Jack Archer voices Ryan in the first two books and then James Darke takes over for the third. It is jarring if you pay attention, which you probably will not since the plot moves fast. For physical copies, paperback editions are still in print. Barnes and Noble and Book Depository both stock them. Used copies on AbeBooks or ThriftBooks can run as low as two dollars if you do not mind creased spines. The trilogy reads as one continuous story split across three volumes. Book one ends on a cliffhanger that will frustrate some readers and electrify others. There is no real way around it. I tried waiting a full week between book one and book two last year and ended up rereading the final chapter four times because I could not focus. Just start book two immediately after finishing book one. The emotional momentum matters more than pacing yourself through these.
What the Book Actually Delivers
This Man is a contemporary romance centered on Charlotte Fielding, a university student who moves into a flat above a pub and develops a sexual relationship with her landlord, Ryan Mitchell. The narrative uses dual POV, switching between Charlotte and Ryan chapter by chapter. Ryan's chapters are notably darker and more internal. Charlotte's chapters tend to be lighter but sometimes feel underdeveloped in terms of her character outside the relationship. The book is not literary fiction. It does not claim to be. What it is good at is sustained sexual tension and emotional escalation. If you want that, it delivers consistently. If you want nuanced character arcs or social commentary, you will be disappointed within the first fifty pages. One thing beginners miss about this series: the relationship dynamic shifts significantly between books. Book one establishes the power imbalance and physical obsession. Book two introduces external conflict and Ryan's backstory. Book three resolves the emotional arc but also introduces a pregnancy plotline that some readers find rushed. The pacing in book three is genuinely uneven. Malpas seems to have been running out of time rather than deliberately choosing to compress events.
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Common Problems and Workarounds
The most frequent complaint I see online is about the spelling and grammar errors that slip through editing. Words like "thats" instead of "that's" appear in early Kindle editions. Most have been corrected in later printings, but if you buy a cheap used copy or an older Kindle file, you will encounter them. The workaround is simple: check the publication date on the edition. Anything printed after 2016 has substantially fewer errors. Before that, you are essentially reading a first draft that happened to sell millions of copies. Another issue is the explicit content. If you are sensitive to graphic sexual content, this book is not for you. It is not borderline. It is front and center from chapter two onward. Some platforms and libraries will not carry it. Amazon and Goodreads both carry content warnings. Read them before you commit. There is also the matter of the ending. Book three closes with what feels like a traditional romance resolution, but it leaves certain threads deliberately unresolved. Ryan's family situation, Charlotte's career path, and the legal complications from earlier in the series all get swept into the final pages. This is a feature of the genre more than a flaw in Malpas's writing, but it still catches people off guard who expect tighter plotting.
How Long It Takes
The combined trilogy runs approximately 900 pages in paperback. Reading straight through without breaks, most people finish it in two to three days. At a normal pace with other obligations, plan about a week. The audiobook is shorter because narration removes some of the internal monologue padding, clocking in around twenty-two hours total across all three books. If you end up liking the series and want more from Malpas, she has written other books including the Fool Me Once trilogy and several standalone novels. None of them reach the same cultural footprint as This Man, but Fool Me Once is a solid thriller-romance hybrid if you want to branch out.
Bottom Line
This Man is exactly what it says it is. A popular romance novel with a devoted fanbase and noticeable technical flaws. It works if you go in with the right expectations. It frustrates if you treat it like something it is not. The series is accessible on every major platform, reads quickly, and has enough emotional payoff to justify the time investment for fans of the genre.
