Laurie suddenly gets dumped by Dan, her boyfriend of 18 years, when he leaves her for another woman to have his child. Distraught, Laurie has to see her ex everyday at the law firm they work at when she gets stuck in a lift with the office heartthrob and player, Jamie, after which they devise a plan: to pretend that they're dating so that Laurie's ex-boyfriend gets jealous and Jamie can be up for a promotion to partner. The word gets around about their "relationship" following some posts on social media and everyone in their lives seems to have an opinion. They have many close moments, worries about their ruse being discovered, work enemies that want to sabotage it from the beginning.
It's an interesting take on the rom-com trope, with the main character being of dual-heritage and the leading man having a deep back story, and the way they deal with the situations thrown at them is graceful more often than not, which makes the characters that much more relatable and likeable and you end up rooting for them. While I dislike the trope where characters don't communicate and that leads to misunderstandings, this novel had very little of it, which was refreshing. The characters felt well-developed and you could really see the progression through the book as Laurie came into herself after losing her spark over the course of her relationship with Dan.
I really enjoyed listening to the Audiobook version of this book, the narrator conveyed the tone and accents so well, it made me relate to the characters that much more and even laugh out loud at points. I was engaged in the story the whole way through and I wanted to know more about the characters and the side-characters too! It felt like a very mature story, it handled every situation with grace and the characters seemed very classy. I would definitely read this again and again, and I recommend it to anyone who is in need of a good rom-com that have a bit more to it than just the romance and whimsical scenarios.