I don't know what happened to my review of this book, and it's been awhile since I read it, but I remember, mostly, that it was hilarious! Loved the made-up character named LOUISE!

Granny With Benefits has been a very entertaining read!
Grace is 39 years old and meets Hol whilst collecting her Grandmother's belongings from her sheltered accommodation. Unfortunately, he walks in just as she is trying on some of the clothes and he thinks she lives there so she tells him her name is Louise! I have to admit, I'm not sure how she could have looked THAT much older just by wearing different attire, but it does lead to an amusing tale of Grace trying to juggle two personas in an attempt to win Hols affections. It did remind me a bit of Mrs Doubtfire at times, but there were no fancy face masks being used here. However they didn't all realise that Grace and Louise were the same person, as time went on, I don't know.
I wasn't sure if I was going to like Grace to begin with, but she did grow on me eventually, although her relationship with Hol did frustrate me at times. I'm not sure I found Hol all that likeable either to be honest. They are both quite childish at times, for their ages, but I guess we all can be sometimes. Things were very hit and miss between them and there are a lot of misunderstandings along the way and ignoring each other. It is a roller-coaster of a story though which held my attention as I was more than a little bit curious to discover how things would work out.
If you enjoy a romantic comedy with more than its fair share of drama then I think you will love this book.

Thirty nine is a difficult age for a woman, particularly if she's not married. Has she given up on the idea of having a family? Does her career mean everything to her? On the other hand is she desperately looking for a man? Grace found herself in a difficult situation when she first met Dale (or Heaven on Legs - HoL - as she thought of him). She'd volunteered to sort out her late grandmother's home, but she couldn't resist the opportunity to do a little dressing up. So, wearing her grandmother's clothes, wig resting just above her eyebrows and heavy-rimmed glasses perched on the end of her nose she met the man of her dreams. Only, rather than laughing and explaining what she'd been doing, Grace carried on the pantomime - and called herself Louise.

And Louise (officially she was Grace's aunt) became quite involved with HoL's family. There never seemed to be a family celebration to which Louise wasn't invited: there was even the merest hint that romance might be on the cards. Sometimes Louise sent her niece along in her place and that was how Grace officially got to know HoL. They were both carrying a bit of baggage around with them - Grace had been married before (the split hadn't been all that civilised) and HoL obviously had commitment problems. He might have understood his distinction between 'seeing someone' and 'being together' but it would have confused most people. To top it all off, Grace has problems at work. Redundancy-sized problems.

I'll confess that to begin with I didn't particularly like Grace. She lied far too easily for my taste, but Marilyn Bennett is exceptionally skillful at keeping her readers balanced on the edge of their seats as they wonder if this is going to be the moment when it all falls apart. Mind you, I didn't go for HoL as much as Grace did, either. He might have looked gorgeous but you wouldn't necessarily have classified him as 'steady' and 'reliable'. Then something rather strange happened: I started to root for Grace. She might not be entirely truthful but she had an underlying honesty to herself and her friends which was very clear-sighted. I liked her friends too. They work well as a group and they're the sort of people everyone needs around them; prepared to tell it as it is, but there when the chips are down. I even started to understand HoL a little more. Bennett develops the characters beautifully and they worm your way into your mind.

In the early part of the story I was convinced that I was going to be reading farce and I was slightly concerned as it's not something which usually appeals to me, but the slapstick comedy morphs into a story of some depth with difficult moral conundrums which set me thinking about what I'd do in a similar situation. I enjoyed the book and the end came far too quickly. I'd like to thank the publisher for sending a copy to the Bookbag.

An unusual concept for a book, but I was intrigued by it and read it despite my reservations and it was a proper laugh out loud story in places and I found I enjoyed it more than I thought I would.

I didn't get very far with this book & had to put aside not far into the story. Am not really into books that have flashback scenes, so did not finish this title.

Well this book was great. So funny, with hilarious romantic situations.
See, romance is for all ages. I had such a laugh with this, the length s someone's will go to saving face, their feeling s and those of others.
A good read from a talented, imaginative and funny author.

Okay, this is a funny and totally different kind of scenario type of book. No spoilers! But...i just don't get pretending to be a deceased family member - no matter why. Seems like it should have been a visit to the psych ward and not the old folks home. Still, a laugh and quick read.

Cute idea, quite funny in spots but moves slowly.
If you have read the synopsis you know Grace meets a likely fellow while she is dressed in her late grandmother's clothes, wig, and glasses. The have a nice chat and she decides to pursue him.
The best parts of this book involve Grace's antics trying to avoid detection. The Supermarket scene early in the book is worth reading for a good laugh.
The problem is that the plot slogs along, Grace getting progressively more devious before she shows up as herself. She has an entire group of people thinking she is her own niece. It sounds cute but it is actually boring.
The book is well copy edited, the characters are well described, the story feels interminable.

This id not my forte, I sm certain that people who like contemporary , quirky bookx will like it. I hope you do.
Thanks! Enjoy!
carolintallahassee👒

I absolutely loved this book, and was very happy to give it 5 stars. Beautifully and sympathetically written, the characters are so real it reads more like a biography than a novel. It does contain a few synchronicities, but I find that happening in real life too!
The story begins towards the end of WW2 where a happy family’s life was torn apart by a bomb landing on their house. The parents were missing, presumed dead. The 3 children were sent to live with an Aunt and Uncle, and then later the younger two were sent to live with a single Aunt, down on the coast, for safety.
Meanwhile a man is saved from the wreckage of a house with amnesia. He has no idea of who he is or where he has come from, but learns that he can play the piano like a virtuoso.
This is a poignant story which will make you smile and cry by turns. It is told from the point of view of the eldest daughter, alternating with that of the Pianist. These are ‘real’ people, flaws and all, and at times you want to shake them but that just adds to the reality of the story.
A historical novel with drama, murder, suspense, intrigue and romance - there is something for everyone!

This book started good. A lot of laugh out loud moments.

The main character Grace has to clean out her late grandmother's room at the retirement home. Just for fun she tries on some of her grandmother's clothes and when she steps out of the bathroom, all dressed up as granny, "Heaven on Legs" is waiting for her. Grace pretends to be her non-existing aunt Louise and starts talking to "HoL" about life, death and the universe.

To feel "HoL" out Grace poses as Louise in several occassion, rationalising it by saying the circumstances made her do it. Then Grace meets "HoL", who, by the way, is also called "HoL" in the chapters from his POV. Instead of dropping Louise, who caught "HoL's" Uncle's eye, Grace keeps switching roles back and forth, creating a tangled web of lies that she will never be able to untangle without causing damage.

I'm not sure what made me finish this book and even start the next one. It's like a train wreck, you just can't look away.

I gave up on this book. I couldn't get past the improbability of the premise, in which the hero was so utterly unobservant that he couldn't tell the difference between a thirty-something wearing her grandmother's clothes, and an actual woman in her 80s. It felt very contrived and I didn't find it very funny.

Top notch chic lit, British style. As good or better than Bridget Jones. I like it so much better. You will be wishing you could be included in the friendship of these gals.

Funny premise, but a bit long winded. The bits were Grace took on the persona of Louise were fun, but unnecessary and a bit awkward the longer the book went on. I ended up trudgeing through the second half of this.

I read this book in only a couple of days and I still feel like I am waiting for the ending. There were several things about this novel that bothered me. When Louise was on the Bus sitting beside Dale and he couldn't be bothered to get off of his phone to keep up a conversation I found myself really frustrated with both him and Louise. While he was ignoring her, she kept talking about how she needed to find something to talk to him about that would keep him interested. It was verging on desperate and, to me, it felt as if .Louise was trying to hard for a guy that didn't care and had no manners.
Grace spoke about fate as they attended some of the same events without knowing it when really that would simply be coincidence since they never actually met at one of the events.
I found myself rooting for Grace to fail throughout the entire book because, to me, that would be the only way for it to play out since she deceived an elderly man who had lost his wife into liking her as Louise and his nephew into liking her as herself. It was kind of an unforgivable deception.
Grace bothered me. She immediately judged Dale as being unable to be anything but a basic and menial job employee when in fact he was a major project manager. There were many things that bothered me about this book, but most were surrounding the main character.
I really wanted to like this book and although the character had these flaws I was reading on waiting for it to all come together in the end in a better light, however I am left disappointed and feeling as if a major "something" was missing from the novel.

It was nice to read something different from the usual crime books I read. Good storyline and engaging characters.

3 stars- This had a different twist which at first seemed very interesting and funny.... but as it continued... the main character had to twist herself into a pretzel to keep up the facade. There were sweet moments and fun... but i keep harking back to the deception that keep taking place

This book has wonderful and inviting intro. It simply invites you to read and interesting humorous story. But in reality ... boy was it an confusing and long story and not even remotely humorous.

True, the story starts in Grace's grandmothers apartment, where she is admiring her coats and tries them on, since they are the reason she agreed to clear the apartment in a first place. So there she is, in her granny's clothes, with her wig and accessories, in front of a mirror, when an young man comes to the door, wanting to know, is it good to live in this assisted living house, since he is thinking bringing his father here. So the granny's "sister Luise" is born, whom Dale invites to his friends grandmother's funeral, where Louise meets with Dale's uncle, father and others in that circle. Dale's uncle develops sweet spot for Louise at once, so Louise is invited to a lot of outings.

Grace does know that she can not keep this up for ever, especially since she has a thing for Dale, so little by little she starts to distance Louise from the group, by sending herself in her place. While Grace is palying Louise her sister has a kid, and she has big reorganizing at work and she visits New York one weekend with her girlfriends and her last boyfriend's father dies ...

Through all this jumpy story Grace is meeting with Dale, sometimes they like each other, then there is some problems and they again torn apart and quite often Grace forgets that she is not supposed to know things that Louis knows ...

So when things finally are moving the way that Grace wants - the changes at work worked really well out for her, her relationship with Dale is getting stronger - then it is a high time for her past to come and wreck it all. Her ex shows up at her door, down with the loss of his father and with the problems in home-front, at the most inconvenient moment. When the first "wrong moment" does not trouble Dale much, then the next one is too much.

Grace, who has weaved pretty complicated net of lies around herself, starts to get tangled in them. Will the last surprise destroy her world and her hopes or will she be able to untangle herself? Will she keep on lying?

This story has too many contradictions and illogical moments that they made this otherwise interesting story into a bad story. All this Clark Kent/Superman disguise with simple wig an classes is just not believable. And all this constant lying at work, at home, in a relationship - it makes you wonder, can Grace even tell a truth, since always when she is in a sticky situation, she lies. And then the story-lines that do not take us anywhere ... . And the biggest mystery for me is - who's grandmother's apartment Grace was cleaning, since farther down in a book, Grace says the only grandparent she has lost is her grandfather?!?!

The idea behind this story is great - rom/com with mistaken identities - but the finished book ... there is just too many things that where more like "second thought" adding, that didn't really give anything to the main story. I wanted to like it, but ...

Grace is clearing out her dead grandmother's things, trying on fancy coats, when a handsome man comes in and she desperately pretends to be her grandmother as he asks questions about the old folks' home. Then she accepts an invitation to the funeral of his relative.

It's a funny setup, but at least for me, it swiftly became unfunny as Grace keeps thinking up stupid excuses to keep being Louise, the old lady, and gets involved with the hero's family (even in the sections from his POV, he's still called HoL, Hunk on Legs, which I found really awkward).

Here and there were some great scenes with Grace, who is facing forty and loneliness, but is unsure about trusting marriage. The thing is, though, she doesn't really protag so much as bump along, lying to everyone as she lets circumstances push her into awkward situations--clear to the end.

Other readers found it hilarious, but I wished it was half the length, and funnier, with Grace actually gaining agency before the life changes of the end.

This was an enjoyable book. I laughed more in the first ten percent on this novel than in the entirety of many others! It explored some interesting situations, engaging the reader easily.