Did You Miss Me? by Sophia Money-Coutts

 

Did You Miss Me? by Sophia Money-Coutts.

Published 19th August 2021 by HQ.

From the cover of the book:

You never forget the one that got away, do you?

Nell Mason is extremely happy with her life – or at least, that’s what she tells herself. She’s lucky to have a high-powered job as a lawyer, even if it does come with an eccentric set of billionaire divorce clients. And she’s absolutely fine living with her sweet, if slightly dull, boyfriend Gus in their London flat where they have very sensible sex once (OK, sometimes twice) a week. She’s definitely not stuck in a rut.

But when Nell bumps into childhood friend and first love Arthur Drummond who broke her heart fifteen years ago, she’s more than a little shaken. The seemingly perfect life she’s worked so hard for starts to feel, well, less perfect. 

Maybe Nell’s been kidding herself all these years. Can she ever get over her first love?

******************************

Nell is convinced everything is fine with her life. She is on track to become partner at her London law firm, if she can keep up with the pace of work and stomach sharing an office with her boorish boss, and is very happy with her boyfriend of eleven years, Gus - even sort of going along with his insistence that marriage is nothing more than a ploy to get couples to spend their hard earned cash on meaningless pomp and ceremony. OK, so her life may not be full of thrills, but she is comfortable with the routine and direction of things, isn't she?

When Nell takes a trip back up to her home town in Northumberland to attend the funeral of Lord Drummond she ends up bumping into his son Art, her first love and the man that broke her heart at his twenty-first birthday party, who is back from New York. It's a meeting that has her musing about what might have been had things worked out differently, but it's not until she is called upon to return north to play nursemaid to her incapacitated father, after her mother drops the bombshell that she is leaving him for pastures new, that she really has a chance to reflect on where life has taken her - especially since Art is still on the scene clearing up his father's messy estate. Is she happy to settle for a busy London life with the safe and secure, if slightly boring, Gus, or does her heart still lie in the north with her first love? And is it time to admit to herself that she really, really wants that big white wedding?

I am a huge Sophia Money-Coutts fan, having loved every one of her books - and this, her fourth book, still has me well and truly hitched to the Money-Coutts rom-com train!

There are so many lovely elements to this book, which give it intriguing depth. This time around, Money-Coutts proceeds to weave in delicious threads about love; marriage; divorce; long-term relationships; family dynamics; friendship: being true to yourself; and having the courage to take a risk; all tied up in a left-of-centre coming of age tale, with her trade-mark injection of a bit of posh totty. Nell herself comes to make decisions that she could never have imagined taking at the start of this story, as she realises that in escaping the pain of her past she has lost sight of her hopes and dreams, but she is not the only one who finds the courage to take the plunge and aim for happiness, and this leads to some very heart-warming outcomes. Incidentally, I loved that there are characters here to appeal to a wider age range, with some acute insight into the staleness that can creep into long-term relationships, and the impact of the breakdown of lengthy marriages; and Money-Coutts takes a very interesting side-swipe at the tendency of high-profile divorce lawyers to lose sight of what's important in pursuit of their reputations as winners too.

For me, this is the perfect summer read, full of sass, sex, sniggers and sentiment. It kept me entertained all the way through, made me fall in love with Nell and Art, laugh out loud with its Bridget Jones-esque humour, get hot under the collar with its steamy interludes, and cry tears of joy as all the threads tied up in one glorious uplifting bow. I loved it!

Did You Miss Me? is available to buy now in hardcover, ebook and audio formats from your favourite book retailer.

Thank you to HQ for providing me with a Netgalley copy of this book in return for an honest review, and for inviting me to be part of this blog tour.

About the author:

Sophia Money-Coutts is a journalist and author who spent five years studying the British aristocracy while working as Features Director at Tatler. Prior to that she worked as a writer and an editor for the Evening Standard and the Daily Mail in London, and The National in Abu Dhabi. She writes a column for The Sunday Telegraph called Modern Manners and often appears on radio and television channels talking about important topics such as Prince Harry’s wedding and the etiquette of the threesome. Did You Miss Me? is her fourth novel.