Book Review: Love Me or Leave Me, by Claudia Carroll

‘Welcome to the Hope Street Hotel – where you check in married, and check out single.’

Two years ago Chloe Townsend was dumped at the altar and had to leave behind everything that mattered to her. Even now she’s finding it hard to move forward. That is until she lands an incredible job, running a brand new boutique hotel. Suddenly she’s starting to put her life back together, and, apart from the fact that her hard-to-please new boss is breathing down her neck, things are looking good.

But what goes on in the Hope Street Hotel is a far cry from anything she’s ever dealt with before. This is a pioneering ‘divorce hotel’ designed to make every aspect of breaking up efficient and pain-free. In one single weekend, Chloe’s team promises to take care of everything – legal, technical, emotional – and guests check out carefree and single.

No one is better qualified than Chloe to understand what couples need when their relationship is at breaking point, but she soon finds herself having to tackle the heartbreak she’s tried to bury. In particular three couples need her help – Jo and Dave, Lucy and Andrew, and Kirk and Dawn – and the opening weekend is full of revelation, trouble, memories happy and sad, facts that need facing, and some very big surprises.

It’s time to move on. And it soon becomes clear that some endings are, in fact, very exciting new beginnings…

***

Thank you to Avon UK for a review copy via NetGalley.

This is the first book I’ve read by Claudia Carroll, but the gorgeous cover instantly grabbed my intention, and I was very intrigued by the idea of a divorce hotel. I wasn’t entirely sure how that could work, but I was eager to find out!

What I loved the most about this book was the diversity. Chloe was a fantastic character, and I loved reading her own story and wanted things to work out for her, but there was also so much to love about the different couples in the Hope Street Hotel, that each character added their own flavour to the book.

It focuses on 3 couples in particular, all of whom are such different characters with very different relationships and situations. There’s Jo, the stern cold-hearted business woman, and her struggling actor husband Dave. There’s Andrew, the rich older husband with his young model wife, Lucy, and sweet, young Dawn and her ethereal hippy husband, Kirk.

I found myself emotionally invested in each different storyline, and I think Claudia did a fantastic job of intertwining the stories. We are dripped bits of information about each couples past as the story progresses, slowly getting to know the full story – from both sides – which builds the tension wonderfully and makes for some great plot twists. As always, first impressions are not always right, and things are not always as they may seem.

It was a really enjoyable read that I highly recommend to any chick lit lover.

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