Title: Wilde Like Me
Author: Louise Pentland
Publisher: Bonnier Zaffre
[Synopsis]
Meet Robin Wilde! You’ll make a friend for life and she’ll take you on a journey you’ll never forget …
Single mum Robin Wilde adores her six-year-old daughter and loves her job as a make up artist’s assistant. She has a wonderful best friend and an auntie who is bonkers, yes, but loves her to the moon and back.
But Robin has a secret. Behind the mask she carefully applies every day, things just feel … grey. And lonely. She struggles to fit in with the school mum crew. Online dating is totally despair-inducing, and she worries every day about raising her little girl with self-confidence, courage and joy.
What Robin longs for is someone (over the age of six) to share with – someone who’s always on her team.
After 4 years (2 months, and 15 days!) of single-mum-dom, it’s time for Robin Wilde to Change. Her. Life.
Exciting new opportunities are about to come Robin’s way … Perhaps a man, perhaps the chance of a lifetime …
What will Robin do with the possibilities she creates for herself? And what potential will she unlock if she takes the leap?
[My Review]
Wilde Like Me is a fun, light-hearted read. It follows Robin Wilde, mum of six year Lyla who’s life, in her eyes anyway, is a bit of a mess. She’s trying to juggle being a single mum and desperately trying to live up to the perfect examples the other mums at her daughter’s school seem to set, whilst feeling pretty lonely at times.
The story itself is easy to read and, at times, really funny. There were parts that really made me laugh, and parts that were a little more serious. The novel focuses a lot on main character Robin’s emotions, which can often be quite up and down, and I liked that these emotions were not something to be excused or apologised for. However I wasn’t sure that Robin’s mental health problems were just due to her being lonely without a man in her life; this felt a bit too ‘simple’, and Robin was also so preoccupied with worrying that Lyla might be negatively affected because she’s is a single mum which is a shame. I suppose that’s what Robin feels is the opinions of society and I’m sure many other people sadly feel this pressure too (I don’t have any kids so I guess I can’t comment on this), but it feels a bit outdated.
Enough about the more serious parts – most of the novel is pretty light-hearted and humorous. Some of the story is unapologetic fluffy, and sometimes that’s just what you feel like reading! Louise Pentland definitely has a knack for writing witty occurrences in an engaging way. There are some great situation that Robin gets herself into which really amused me, though sometimes she is far too hard on herself – she IS doing a great job as a mum, though she can be a bit annoying sometimes!
I lost interest a bit in some of the story in the second half, but overall I feel that it’s a fun read which I enjoyed, and I think this will be a popular read.
[Rating: 3/5]
Many thanks to Readers First for providing a copy of this novel on which I chose to write an honest and unbiased review.