The series premise centered on Emily (Graham), an editor of self-help books who is unable to find success in romance.

In the premiere episode she ends a bad relationship and adopts a new rule for her romances: if she can list five reasons to break up with a guy, then she does so.

ABC was said to have spent millions on promotion, including airtime, billboards and radio ads, and considered Emily to be the "linchpin" of the network's post-football Monday-night schedule.

[4] The New York Times attributed the cancellation in part to the extremely unappealing nature of the main character and the portrayal by Graham.

[5] In 2006, all six episodes of the show aired on Spain's pay-TV channel Cosmopolitan under the title Cinco razones (para no salir contigo) ("Five Reasons (to not go out with you)"),[6] on Sony Entertainment Television,[7] on ORF1 in Austria, and on POP TV in Slovenia.