⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️☆ (4/5)
Sweet and swoony, this romantic comedy is full of warmth, witty dialogue, and slow-burn charm. Jessica Stanley builds chemistry beautifully, and the emotional payoff is totally worth the wait. A delightful, feel-good story perfect for fans of cozy, character-driven romance.

I absolutely loved this book - a beautifully written, smart, witty and clever literary love story. I haven't loved a book this much in a while. Coralie felt like a friend and a confidant by the end of the book. Perfect for Virginia Woolf fans. Loved this!!

Coralie leaves her native Australia and transfers to the London office of her copywriting job after a bad experience with her boss. Her future seems bright when she falls in love with Adam, divorced father to gorgeous toddler Zora, and moves in with him, yet somehow life seems to keep getting in the way. Adam’s job as a political journalist and author has him putting in long hours and takes him away from home, leaving Coralie to keep the home fires burning while juggling childcare, of Zora and later their children together, and her own work under the disapproving eye of her current boss. She feels the guilt and longing of the working mother, and far from home while her own family in Australia is crumbling. Things need change- but how? I could not have loved this book more- the plot might sound depressing, and it is certainly emotional, but it is also very funny and totally relateable. All the characters are so individual, believable and well-drawn, and Stanley is very good at portraying children- the different stages of Zora are fabulous. This turbulent period of British history really comes alive, and the occasional political observations are hilarious. A total delight from start to finish.

Firstly thank you to Netgalley & the publishers for this arc.

While there were aspects I really enjoyed about this book, it was realistic, relatable & somewhat funny in places, unfortunately it just wasn’t for me. It jumped around a lot at the start which made it confusing & hard to read, and I found it too descriptive in places where theres no need to be, while in other parts there was no explanations or descriptions where I thought it was required, adding to the confusion more. Whilst there were also hard topics being discussed which I can fully relate to & appreciate the ones I cannot, most of the time it felt like Coralie was just very overly dramatic (Australia not being a country by the time her children were old enough to visit?) even the slightest things just seemed like the end of the world and was a bit over the top

I also felt like it was more about politics than Coralies story. I felt like I was reading one of Adams books and it was so heavily about politics it was boring after a while. I dont think there was a chapter without mentioning the Tory party or Boris Johnson so didn’t feel like the title had anything to do with the book and where it did reference a romance felt like it was just slotted it after the fact - only the last 4% & first 2% really felt like the story i was expecting from the blurb. The rest was just a retelling of English politics & how much people disliked the Torys.

Overall an interesting read but unless you’re into politics, I wouldn’t recommend.

Coralie has moved to the UK from Australia after disasters at home and at work, and unexpectedly meets and falls for single-dad Adam and his five year old daughter, but what happens after that? What happens when real life enters the fray?

I was expecting this novel to be a straight-forward love story, but what I found was something much more nuanced. This is a grown-up love story with a difference, set over 10 years, which talks about the realities of life after the meet-cute and the seeming happy-ever-after, with themes of feminism, family and politics- being particularly interested in the 'wife and mother' role that many women find themselves in, and the danger in becoming the woman who takes on all the mental load and life laundry of family life at the expense of her career and her self.

There's a lot to unpack in the novel, and I've found myself thinking about it long after I'd finished. What it says about expectations on women rang so true for me, as Coralie tries to be the perfect partner, create the perfect home, be the perfect mother, succeed in her career and support Adam in everything he does. It's also a book about what makes a family, and I really loved the bonkers cast of characters who make up the very chaotic blended (and dysfunctional!) family that Coralie becomes part of, which contrasts greatly with the family that she grew up with. The landscape of the book is also noteable as its set against Brexit, the post-Brexit mad political landscape and the Covid years. As an aside, it's the first time I've been able to read about those things with any distance, and it really brought it home the mayhem of these times which gives an extra drama to the whole piece.

Some of the scenes are pretty devastating, as well as funny and there are some great set-pieces.

This would be a great read for a bookclub, with so much to discuss, and I'd recommend it to anyone who loves intelligent fiction, particularly on the role of women in relationships, work, and in wider society, and those who love novels about dysfunctional families.

Thanks to netgalley and Random House for this digital proof

A modern romance but warts and all. Meeting, moving in, having a family, lockdown, juggling and losing your sense of self.
Dysfunctional nuclear family that leaving Australia and an obsessive boss leads to a fresh and exciting start in London.
Lots of this book will resonate with lock down mums. The daily juggle of children, blended families and trying to do your best whilst your own needs come way down the list.
An honest and emotional book.

I was completely absorbed in Coralie’s life, I devoured it. I didn’t think I’d enjoy the realistic backdrop of politics and Covid, but it made the story relatable and real. I also always love a novel set in London, my favourite city. It would have been more rewarding if we’d had a more in depth look into Coralie’s suffering and how her and Adam get through to the other side, this felt a little rushed, but other than that it was an engaging, witty, modern look at family, love and motherhood.

Really good book that i will recommend to others.

Thanks for the opportunity to read & review it.

Loved this book! If it's something i love it's when you find a book that immerses you entirely in the lives of fictional people , one that takes you over a decade and one that you feel very sad to finish. Over 10 years we follow Coralie who arrives in London from Australia and starts to build a life . But we also follow the political scene in the UK over the time and also serves as a sort of novel about 21st century Britain . Obviously a lot happens and you will have to read it to find out more ! It's about relationships, life ,politics and just feels so real, it's going to be very popular I am sure !

I was so excited to get approved for this one after a very well known author recommended it. From the first few pages I just knew I was going to love it. I loved the storyline at the beginning and it was unlike anything I had read before. The political aspect of the book I didn’t love, whilst I remember lots of what was mentioned I did feel it was a bit over mentioned. Having said that I really enjoyed it and it was quite refreshing to read something so different.

I loved the first part of this book. It was funny, romantic, depicted the coming together of two people getting to know each other and forging a loving relationship with each other and their close families. The second part I felt was
worrying and disjointed. It seemed to flit from one character to another without continuity. Finally everything came together I. The last part -two people who truly loved each other had worked their way through the trials of everyday life and come out the other end with their relationship better for it.

A book of two halves for me. I adored the first 40/50%. It was so funny and touching and I fell in love with the characters. Coralie's voice and POV was brilliant, managing to be funny, sharp and something incorrigibly Australian-in-London that I found utterly charming. All the characters were sketched immaculately and vividly with depth and nuance.

However it started falling flat for me past the halfway mark. I'm not convinced the background of Brexit and British politics really added much to the story, apart from provide a reason for Adam's absences and an extra weight on Coralie's mental health. The charm and sparkle of the narration fizzled out; perhaps that was a deliberate device to again demonstrate Coralie's increasing floundering but I felt the pace suffered for it and it stripped back a little of the genuine genius evident in the opening chapters.

The book hooked a promise of an arc leading to Coralie leaving the family home and while it did happen, so little time was spent on the apex of the crisis and its resolution, it felt a wee bit unsatisfying.

I'm probably being a bit harsh but only because I loved parts of it sooo much I wanted to adore the rest of it. I would definitely pick up the next thing Jessica Stanley writes.

romantic comedy set across 10 years of U.K politics as aussie expat coralie falls in love with political journalist adam and builds a big, blended family in london. this is very richard curtis rich yuppie charming, it is SO hackney to the point that it's quite jarring if you live there, but in a way that ultimately i found endearing. i thought all of this was very sweet and comforting and it's nice to read a romcom that feels completely ull of life but still broadly normal and not dominated by miscommunications for the sake of tension, or dramatic reasons why people can't be together. just some normal people making it work!! i liked this a lot and would read whatever jessica stanley writes next!

I loved this sooooooooo much. Such a gentle and beautiful book, will be thinking about these characters for a long time! I fell into their lives so easily and wonderfully. Really special!

So much more than a romance it's a love story that takes in Brexit, Boris, covid, step families, toxic parents and, well, life. I adored Coralie and her family and felt her pain and despair at times, Joy at others. A delightful, refreshing and thoughtful read and also very funny.

4.5★s
Consider Yourself Kissed is the second novel by Australian-born author, Jessica Stanley. Needing to escape a hurtful break-up, the legacy of a troubled upbringing, and a demanding boss who grossly oversteps, in late 2012, twenty-nine-year-old copywriter, Coralie Bower heads to her firm’s London branch.

She’s working hard but staying under the radar, keeping to herself, because this is her chance, in her spare time, to write, to consolidate the notes, the bits written on the back of receipts, the emails to herself, the notebooks, into something worthwhile. But it’s not easy with a noisy pub next door.

Saving a cute four-year-old girl from drowning in a duck pond brings her instantly to the attention of the girl’s rather dishy father: they seem to easily connect and, soon enough, they’re dating. Within a few months, Coralie has packed up her worldly goods and moved in with Adam Whiteman, journalist, podcaster, author, political commentator, and divorced father of Zora.

It’s not too hard to gain Zora’s approval, and soon she is sharing her care with the ex and her new partner, gay grannies and, of course, Adam. Theirs is a wonderful life, but the casualty is Coralie’s writing, for which there is never the right moment, or enough of them.

And the turbulence of the coming decade in British politics seems to ensure that, again and again, Adam’s work takes priority: a book deadline, an election, Brexit; there’s always something urgent that keeps him busy and has her juggling work, home and childcare. Because it really feels, more and more often, like Zora’s other carers are taking advantage of Coralie’s generous nature.

Nonetheless, she throws herself enthusiastically into the relationship. Home renovations, two pregnancies that produce a daughter and a son but, after ten years together, there’s even less me time. “She was like a sandcastle, and Adam and the kids were like the sea, eroding her and flattening her with their proximity and demands. If she went for a walk, or listened to a podcast, she could begin rebuilding her ramparts, only to get knocked down again by wave after wave of needs.”

Complaints would bring temporary minor changes but to “Ask an ambitious show-off to refuse high-status work? She wasn’t mad.” Eventually, at crisis point, she has to ask herself is she complicit in her own situation? ”Not insisting on things she wanted. Talking herself out of complaining. She’d floated away, mentally. A ghost in her own life. She’d nearly floated away for good. She was crying.”

But what to do about it? She felt that “Something was wrong with her, it set her apart – she couldn’t be in love, but she couldn’t be out of it either. If she didn’t love, she was half a person. But if she did love, she’d never be whole.” But can she just walk away?

This is a story that will resonate strongly with working mothers, with step-parents, and those with an interest in British politics in recent decades, of which there is quite a lot. Stanley’s own experience with journalism and political campaigns gives the story authenticity and makes it wholly credible. Half a star off for the pregnant bloke, though.

Stanley populates her novel with engaging characters while her protagonist has depth and appeal. She gives the reader a topical, relatable tale that is often laugh-out-loud funny, might sometimes make the reader indignant, and occasionally brings a lump to the throat. Funny, insightful, and thoroughly enjoyable.
This unbiased review is from an uncorrected proof copy provided by NetGalley and Random House UK.

I thoroughly enjoyed this! I am a big fan of reading novels where it spans years, decades. From the start I was hooked and wanted to learn more about Coralie and her family. It was an interesting point of view for me to see the lens of UK politics through Coralie's eyes and how they processed political news in the day to day while living through their own heartaches, joys and grief. I would recommend to anyone who loves a novel that follows a character around, enjoys learning more about how events shaped the UK in the past decade, and is always rooting for the main character. Would definitely read again!

A captivating story about trying to have it all and losing yourself along the way. Tapping into the crushing pressure women have to always manage, to succeed but never be proud, to get on with it - in the very first few pages I felt something linking us together.

Between 2013 and now, we watch a beautiful love story come to life and fall apart - before and after “the happy ever after”, seeing how real life, a changing world, responsibilities and growing up can change and morph relationships throughout the years.

An accomplished, beautifully written story but I just found the characters very distant, I could never connect to them and found their interactions quite stiff, stuck behind walls of speech and I just never found that flow with them until very late in the book.

I adored this book. It has multiple layers and complexities and feels so real. I’m looking forward to reading it again in a few months, to absorb more of the subtleties in the elegant writing.

I read this book with great anticipation, knowing the author's reference points had included The Cazalet Chronicles and I Capture the Castle. I can see the DNA of these books in this accomplished piece of fiction, that skilfully blends the domestic with bigger political events of the last decade. I loved a funny scene that saw the protagonists encounter an angry, blustering Boris Johnson when trying to leave a restaurant! This novel portrays a middle-class, occasionally smug, London lifestyle, that will feel familiar to some and alienating to others, however the themes explored, including parenthood, relationships and grief should resonate with many.