I really enjoyed this book. Kirsty Capes seems to have a real talent of capturing modern life and I love how authentic her characters are. I really liked how she highlighted the illusion of social media perfection and Lucy’s desire to be seen as thriving.

Lucy was a fantastic character – flawed, infuriating at times but ultimately really relatable. She was socially awkward, prickly and defensive as she tried to mask her vulnerability and insecurity. I enjoyed being on that journey of self-discovery with Lucy as she realised she didn’t have to constantly pretend to be somebody she wasn’t.

I felt fully immersed in the story and Lucy’s world. Her friends and family felt authentic and real, as did her struggles to communicate with them. Lucy is someone who craves organisation and so when her life becomes increasingly chaotic I could completely emphasise with her panic and anxiety.

There were some sensitive topics covered, such as mental health, abuse and alcoholism and I felt they were handled well.

I enjoyed the tentative steps Lucy took when opening up to flatmate Cam and how patient he was with her. The reader grows to love Lucy alongside her flatmates and friends as she began to reveal more of her true self

This was a lovely read. Given that this dealt with difficult topics, it was dealt with in a sensitive way. The main character was likeable and i found myself drawn in by the narrative. This was my first book by the author and I’d definitely read others.

I loved this book. Beautifully drawn characters, genuine emotional depth and vivid descriptions of places and situations that made me feel immersed in Lucy's world.

Another gem from a brilliant author. I love this author and this is one that hasn’t disappointed. This is a book that has pulled me in and I have devoured in just one sitting.
Addictive plot, great characters and a book that is worthy of all the praise.

This was a great read - super easy and flowed so nicely. I raced through it which is always a good sign!

A quick and easy read that I found myself picking up after a long day to unwind. The characters are beautifully written and I came to love them within the first few pages and was rooting for them all the way to the end. At times I wanted to stop reading because I just wanted the experience to go on for longer.

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

It's a real journey of self-discovery for Lucy in this book. Whimsical but never frivolous, sweet but not sugary, deeply kind rather than merely nice. I loved it.

When Lucy Banbury discovers at a family wedding that she's adopted, her whole world is shattered. Those cracks she's taken years to plaster over are beginning to surface and she's not sure how much longer she can keep all her secrets hidden, all whilst pretending to be someone she's not...

Lucy worries about everything, what people are saying or thinking about her, a constant battle that always ends with her feeling she is not good enough. Without meaning to she alienates people by saying the wrong thing. Lucy is also a bit OCD when it comes to dirt or mess.

Kirsty Capes has done an excellent job on portraying a character brought up to hide her feelings, not cry and pretend everything is okay all of the time. This is not surprising considering all the aspects of her life that have been hidden from her, subconsciously Lucy acts it all out. If she can just do this or that, she won’t feel like an outsider but of course it is all slowly crumbling around her and that needs to happen in order for Lucy to find a reality she can fit into.

This feels like a new story, not just an adoption story but one that takes those subconscious feelings around not fitting in and brings them into the open for a good airing before replacing with hope. I really enjoyed getting to know Lucy and had my fingers crossed for her the whole way through.

Love Me Love Me Not is a worthy companion novel to Careless, Kirsty Capes' brilliant first book.

Where Careless explored the care system from an insider's point of view, LMLMN features Lucy, who only found out that she was adopted when she was an adult. We meet Lucy after she's found out the lifechanging news - the story of how she finds out is heart-breaking when we learn it later in the book.

At first meeting, Lucy has achieved everything she's set out to get, at 26 she has a senior role in a start up, good friends, lovely flatmates and presents as very successful and put-together. But this is all a façade, and as readers we know this long before Lucy does. She keeps her emotions firmly locked up and over analyses every conversation whilst its happening Lucy sees herself as happy and lighthearted but this isnt how others perceive her. She is simultaneously terrified of people finding out the truth about her working class family and alcoholic brother, she keeps them at arms length as well.

Reading the book, I just wanted to give Lucy a big cuddle and tell her she's enough as she is, that she doesn't have to change herself to fit in with anybody's demands least of all her own, The story is a glorious journey of acceptance and learning to find your own voice. I read it in one take and would have loved it to go on for longer!

Initially, the plot synapsis of "Love Me, Love Me Not" by Kristy Capes intrigued me. Unfortunately, despite the author's efforts to write a complex character, the main heroine comes out quite bland and at times I found it hard to truly engage with the story, which seemed so promising.

[Minor spoilers ahead] The plot of the big family secret surfacing from Lucy's repressed memories wasn't navigated particularly well, in my opinion, especially not in its aftermath, as it oversimplified a very complex issue.

Lucy wants to be in control, but her life is chaotic. She's trying to live the London life, but instead is reeling from the revelation that she is adopted.

This story is enjoyable, but the chaos that is Lucy's life also seems to somewhat dominate the way the story is told. There were many occasions where people just speaking directly to each other would have made for a more straightforward life for Lucy - and story overall. As a result, I didn't feel this was the kind of book you could relax with and instead was one where you had to go with the slightly frustrating and frenetic life that Lucy lived.

If you enjoy this book and haven't yet read Kirsty Capes' first book 'Careless' then it's definitely worth a read.

Lucy is a woman in her 20’s living in a flatshare and struggling to find out who she is. She’s recently learned that she’s adopted and there is tension between her and her family. I was keen to read this as I loved Careless and I thought it was enjoyable but not hugely gripping.

The synopsis of this novel really appealed to me as I have my own lived experience of adoption. At the beginning of the novel we discover that Lucy , the 20 something protagonist has recently discovered that she is adopted. Lucy is not immediately likeable but the author does bring her world alive and there is an interesting cast of characters. It was a mixed read for me but ultimately I found it lacking in depth and flow.
Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read and review this digital ARC>

I really liked Kirsty's first book, and this was also a very good read. Twenty-something Lucy Banbury's life looks fine on the surface - she has a good job which she claims to love, and carefully curates her London girl-about-town persona. Underneath, she worries obsessively about what people think of her, convinced she's never good enough and never able to relax and drop her guard for a second. Despite her efforts she still often manages to say the wrong thing and alienate people. It's an exhausting business being Lucy, because just under the surface is a teeming mass of insecurity and family issues, not least her alcoholic brother Danny and the fact that she's only just found out she's adopted.

It's a real journey of self-discovery for Lucy , but it's also a rattling good read with some great characters. Cam was a diamond (and Winston, of course), though Anais and Ash were a bit annoying. I did love the Winston storyline. The ending leaves things hanging a bit in terms of any answers regarding the adoption, but I understand why it was done this way.

A shoehorned-in reference at one point to Lucy watching a YouTube video "about TERFs", apropos of nothing, felt clumsy and ill-judged, and should probably be edited out.

Generally a really well written book with some interesting characters, which I thoroughly enjoyed.

Goodreads review
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/4722301670

Advanced PR copy granted by Orion Publishing Group.

Love Me, Love Me Not by Kirsty Capes is a story that requires patience and perseverance. The book begins by dropping you into Lucy's life post-adoption revelation bombshell, and you spend the rest of the time building up the full picture by flitting between the past and present. You don't particularly like Lucy at first - she's complicated and flawed - but, like her housemates and her friends, you grow to love her as she opens up. There are some heartbreaking elements of this story that are dealt with maturely and the main romance element is a delightful, simmering slow-burn. This story really captures attention at about the halfway point. I would recommend practising persistence until then. Trust me, you will be rewarded.

Places where I have mentioned Love Me, Love Me Not

EVERYTHING I WANT TO READ IN JUNE 2022 :https://cigarettesounds.com/2022/05/20/everything-i-want-to-read-in-june-2022/

SUMMER READING PLANS: FOUR WOMEN WRITTEN NOVELS TO GET EXCITED ABOUT: https://cigarettesounds.com/2022/05/15/summer-reading-plans-four-women-written-novels-to-get-excited-about/

Waterstones: https://www.waterstones.com/reviews/love-me-love-me-not/kirsty-capes/9781398700123/252902#review-252902

I really was looking forward to reading this book as I loved “Careless”, the writers first book. This book unfortunately didn’t do it for me, in fact it was DFR for me which is very rare. I really found the lace the story slow, the story boring and as it was mainly a character driven story the fact I didn’t click or like the main character made for not great reading. Thanks for thorn ARC but this wasn’t any where near as good as the writers debut novel.

Kirsty Capes's Careless was one of 2021's highlights for me: it's a book that has really stayed with me, a book that made me gasp and cry and feel completely moved. So obviously I was anticipating Love Me, Love Me Not and whilst I don't think this was *quite* as good as her debut, I really enjoyed it!

Lucy is a prickly, highly-strung character who is determined to be in complete control of her life and shake off her council estate upbringing. Aged twenty-six, she lives in London, she loves her shiny job and she thinks she has plenty of friends. All is going well until she finds out she's adopted — after which her life starts to very gently unravel.

This has got low reviews on Goodreads because the character is too passive and I have to say I think they're completely missing the point. I thought Kirsty Capes did a brilliant job of creating a character who is so convinced by her own falsely constructed narrative that she has trouble seeing outside of it, and the way she explores dealing with trauma of all different kinds is so delicately and believably done. For some reason I just really like the simple but eloquent way that Kirsty writes, and I think I'm always going to be a fan of her work. It's quite rare to see adoption and care-experienced narratives, and I love the way that Kirsty is bringing these stories into the light.

I also loved the depiction of the mid-twenties millennial London lifestyle in this – I lived in London for less than a year but it felt completely impeccably done to me, one of the best I've ever seen – and I really liked Lucy's two flatmates, Ash and Cam and the way their friendships are both complicated and genuine. Also a truly minor point but at one point it's mentioned that Lucy's friend Anaïs is 5'2 and honestly brownie points to the author for not constantly throwing in references to how 'tiny' the character is! I'm 5'1 and I find it really incredibly annoying to read about lol, I'm not a doll so stop treating me like one.

Anyway, I didn't like this as much as Careless because I felt it was missing both an emotional heart and narrative momentum; I feel like the action should have got going a bit sooner. I also could not suspend my disbelief that she would ever actually go out with Tom when he's so irredeemably awful and, personally, I would have liked a bit more self-awareness and self-interrogation on Lucy's part. This, coupled with the fact that it was a wee bit tropey/sentimental at times, makes Love Me, Love Me Not a like rather than a love book for me – but I know that Kirsty Capes is an author I will undoubtedly keep returning to!

Sadly this didn't work for me. It struggled to hold my attention, and many times I felt like giving up. Didn't feel invested enough in the main character.

Lucy has tried to be perfect; she has spent years cultivating how she appears to the world around her. However, when she discovers she is adopted the façade she has been working so hard to keep in place slowly starts to fracture.

I had to DNF this book around 15% through. I felt Lucy was a very passive character with a bland voice, I found her unlikable and dull. Throughout what I read of the book; the information was simply told to the reader. I kept waiting for something to happen, but nothing ever seemed to.

From the beginning we learn she is adopted and there are a lot of changes in Lucy’s life, but they don’t seem to really affect her on any emotional level which I found hampered my investment in her character. Also, there was no real reason to keep reading because there was nothing I had to find out, there was no driving force or burning questions.

Although this book didn’t appeal to me, it may to others.

Thank you to NetGallery and the publisher for the advanced copy of this book in return for an honest review.