This book contains:
- Mental health issues (anxiety, depression, addiction, narcissism and probably a few more)
- Toxic workplace depicted as a manipulative and abusive boss
- Casual sexual encounters, including affairs
- Sexual assault to various degrees from making someone uncomfortable through to rape (the rape is discussed, including some of what happened).
The primary character we follow throughout the book is Kate, a 43-year-old single woman desperate to share her life with someone. While she tries to come across as a confident woman who knows her self-worth and who she is, in reality, she’s highly insecure and easily triggered into self-destructive behaviours.
We also get the occasional chapter from the perspective of Julie (Kate’s best friend) and Ben (Julie’s older brother) to help us get more depth to what Kate’s going through and what’s happening around her.
We start the story with Kate drunk at a New Years Eve wedding deciding that she’s going to find someone to kiss by the following NYE. Over the course of the following 12 months, we follow Kate as she enters the realm of online dating trying to find herself a boyfriend.
Over that time there are many other challenges that pop up, and she needs to navigate each of these as best she can.
When Rachel sent this out she labelled it as a romantic comedy, so my expectations of what I’d be getting out of this book was more along the lines of something from Rich Amooi (who’s books are hilarious by the way!) or Camilla Isley. What I ended up reading was quite different to my expectations.
That’s not to say that it wasn’t amusing, or that it was bad!
It’s just something I’d label as more of a fiction and romance book. A bit of equal parts. The reason I would take the comedy part out is that the expectation people place on a comedy is to spend most of the time laughing, and this is much to serious for that.
With heavy themes discussed (just check out the trigger warning section above) I don’t think it’s appropriate or correct to label this as a comedy.
Overall, I really enjoyed this book. It’s great to see more mature aged women as the lead character in a romance, while also depicting the struggles of online dating, especially as an older woman. But I also enjoyed reading about how subtle people’s reactions and responses can be to those who don’t know what happened to them. And of course, the way each character placed blame on themselves for things outside of their control and how they navigated through to acceptance that they’re not to blame for what happened to them.
Author Bio
Jamie Anderson is based in Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada. A proud Canadian and Saskatchewanian, she wanted to set her first two novels in the place she was born and raised.
She works in content marketing, has a certificate in professional writing and has done a smattering of freelance writing, character development and copyediting over the past several years.
She’s been writing for as long as she can remember, and has been reading for longer than that. She lives happily with her mountain of books, her TV and her two plants. Sign-up to Jamie’s newsletter for news on her followup romance novel Love, Julie. You’ll also receive exclusive deals, special offers and a FREE copy of Jamie’s sweet, uplifting novella Running from Christmas as a welcome gift!
