Review: The Do-Over

The Do-Over by Bethany Turner
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Three and a half stars.

McKenna Keaton think she has been summoned to the boardroom in her swanky New York law firm to pitch to become a senior partner, instead she is put on administrative leave without pay accused of embezzling over $300,000 from the firm. In an attempt to salvage her pride (and conserve money) she leases out her apartment and returns home to Durham, North Carolina.

McKenna has always had a life plan, when she was very young she decided to be a lawyer and she has been 100% focused on that goal ever since. Even at school she chose her dates based on whether they would want more time than she was willing to give. In fact, it would be true to say that McKenna is so focused on her career that she misses some pretty big things, like the fact that her nerdy high school rival Henry Blumenthal is now renowned documentary maker Hank Blume and he looks mighty fine all grown up. One look at Henry (sorry, but Hank is such an old-fashioned name in the UK I can't believe Henry chose it in order to make him sound younger!) and McKenna is reduced to a gibbering idiot, something that has never happened to her before in her thirty-eight years.

This book sits uneasily for me on the boundary between slapstick comedy, rom-com, and women's fiction with a side order of pop-culture infusion. On that last point, in my opinion pop-culture allusions really work bets either when they are so iconic that everyone understands them even if they have never seen the film/read the book etc, or where they are so achingly hip that the reader just feels more cultural for having seen them. This fell between the two stools, referencing films and people I'd never heard of or couldn't remember.

Also, a pet peeve, McKenna is thirty-eight but reads like twenty-eight (or younger), it's as if the author wanted her to be pushing for named partner promotion but realised that could only happen in her late thirties so change McKenna's age without giving her maturity, and don't get me started on her youngest sister Taylor!

Overall, I felt it stalled in the middle and I had no idea where the book was going, I'm not even sure of the relevance of the title TBH. It picked up towards the end but relied upon a lucky coincidence (been deliberately vague) to achieve resolution.

I liked it but I didn't love it.

I received a free copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley in return for an honest review.

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