Thirty-year-old Carlene Rivers has grown tired of her mundane life in Cleveland, Ohio. Miraculously, her life is forever changed when she wins the deed to a pub in Ireland. To the surprise of her friends and family, Carlene actually flies out to Ballybeog, where she quickly falls in love with the quaint town and becomes smitten with the pub's handsome owner, Ronan McBride.
Ronan gambles away his family's pub (in his defence, it was a 4 aces hand) to his horrible uncle, who wants to turn it into a tanning salon. His 6 sisters, rather than seeing it go to Uncle Joe, raffle the pub off in America. Carlene buys a $20 raffle ticket at an Irish festival in Ohio, and wins. She moves to Ireland to make a go of running the pub and chaos and romance ensue.
This is pure chick-lit. Heavy on romance, light on sex, with a lot of humour and some odd pranks thrown into the mix. I enjoyed it, but it's long; longer than it needed to be and the beginning was a slog; I wasn't necessarily interested in the blow-by-blow of Ronan losing the pub, or Carlene's history of bad luck. Once past that though the story picked up pace and I thought Ronan's gambling and Carlene's father's OCD added a much needed depth to the story. The twist at the end was pretty effective too.
If you've a weakness for the Irish (who doesn't?) and are in the mood for a mostly feel-good read that celebrates, first and foremost, the power of friendship and community, you might enjoy this one.
Reading updates
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Started reading
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22 August, 2017:
Finished reading
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22 August, 2017:
Reviewed