I got an "advance review copy (ARC)" of this novel, which is not due to be published until July.
I have to say that I just loved it. It's partly that it's a very well-structed romantic comedy.
But very much more than that, it's the authorial voice which is thoughtful, not glib, not too highfalutin and to me, terribly witty. To me, there's something so satisfying about that witty voice.
JoJo Moyes is also the author of Me Before You and the Girl You Left Behind, which were very popular in 2013. I haven't read either of them - there are so many things I want to read. But having this ARC copy made it convenient and it's almost true that once I started I couldn't put it down. I didn't really care about the characters until chapter three. But then, I felt, as one does - that I just HAD TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENS TO THEM IN THE END.
Jess is a cleaner. Actually she has two jobs. One is being a bartender in a pub, and the other is cleaning houses.
She married her high school boyfriend when she got pregnant at 17. A few years later, she learned that he had already fathered another child with another woman at the time of their marriage. She learned this because her husband, fearful of the child's mother's addiction, asked to take this child into their home.
They struggled greatly to make ends meet. Her husband's get rich quick - or get rich slowly - schemes not only did not succeed, but backfired so that they were never able to secure any financial security and he became depressed. He stopped working, took to his bed, and eventually moved back in with his mother.
Jess works a lot of hours at her two jobs. Her elder child, Nicky, is regularly beat up because he's different; her younger child, Tanzie (short for Costanza) is a gifted child who loves mathematics. She wants to protect her son and doesn't know how and she wants to provide academic opporunities for her daughter and she has no idea how to do that, either.
She's desperate, it's true, but she's also someone with an almost unbeatable case of optimism who's so fond of reassuring her children that they think it's funny that she always says that everything will be all right although it never has been to date.
I have to say that I just loved it. It's partly that it's a very well-structed romantic comedy.
But very much more than that, it's the authorial voice which is thoughtful, not glib, not too highfalutin and to me, terribly witty. To me, there's something so satisfying about that witty voice.
JoJo Moyes is also the author of Me Before You and the Girl You Left Behind, which were very popular in 2013. I haven't read either of them - there are so many things I want to read. But having this ARC copy made it convenient and it's almost true that once I started I couldn't put it down. I didn't really care about the characters until chapter three. But then, I felt, as one does - that I just HAD TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENS TO THEM IN THE END.
Jess is a cleaner. Actually she has two jobs. One is being a bartender in a pub, and the other is cleaning houses.
She married her high school boyfriend when she got pregnant at 17. A few years later, she learned that he had already fathered another child with another woman at the time of their marriage. She learned this because her husband, fearful of the child's mother's addiction, asked to take this child into their home.
They struggled greatly to make ends meet. Her husband's get rich quick - or get rich slowly - schemes not only did not succeed, but backfired so that they were never able to secure any financial security and he became depressed. He stopped working, took to his bed, and eventually moved back in with his mother.
Jess works a lot of hours at her two jobs. Her elder child, Nicky, is regularly beat up because he's different; her younger child, Tanzie (short for Costanza) is a gifted child who loves mathematics. She wants to protect her son and doesn't know how and she wants to provide academic opporunities for her daughter and she has no idea how to do that, either.
She's desperate, it's true, but she's also someone with an almost unbeatable case of optimism who's so fond of reassuring her children that they think it's funny that she always says that everything will be all right although it never has been to date.
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