Review: Just Friends

Just Friends by Jo Lovett
My rating: 1 of 5 stars

DNF at 48%.

Lily and Matt dated for 15 months eight years ago (just let that sink in). One of Lily's BFFs, Tess, is also Matt's cousin and she is having a destination wedding in Greece which also includes hen nights and stag dos etc. Shortly after they broke up, Matt married someone else, although he is now divorced.

Obviously these two are still in love with each other, but Lily in particular has some issues, rooted in her severe asthma as a child which have left her paranoid about being pitied or treated as less than capable because her parents basically wrapped her in cotton wool. Now, even as an adult she can't/won't accept help, even when her beloved grandmother died, and broke up with Matt because he tried to talk to her about her grandmother's death! Even after dating (and living together) for 15 months Matt had absolutely no idea that Lily had severe asthma as a child, that spent most of her childhood in and out of hospitals, or even that she still has to use inhalers religiously twice a day.

Despite their mutual attraction, Lily continues to push Matt away and is irrationally angry that he got married just a year after she broke up with him. But fate, Lily's meddling friends, and a Carry On style series of wedding disasters contrives to throw these two together.

I have really enjoyed Jo Lovett books in the past but this is just dragging on and on and on. I am past the publication date and forcing myself to continue reading, because it's not awful, just slow and a bit slapstick (phallic water fountain features, a bridezilla, a man-mad friend who cops off with a local chef/waiter, the groom breaks his finger, etc). But then I looked and I'm still not even halfway through and I just lost the will to continue. I just don't like Lily very much TBH so I have given up.

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

View all my reviews