Can You Keep A Secret? by Jo Lovett: Warm-hearted dramedy
Can You Keep A Secret? by Jo Lovett is a comedic, warm-hearted friendship and romance drama. Read my review of the audiobook narrated by Harrie Dobby.
Publication: Boldwood Books, March 2024
Unabridged Audiobook narrated by Harrie Dobby, 8hrs 35mins
Genre: Drama, Romance
Can You Keep A Secret? Publisher Synopsis
One secret could change everything…
One New Year’s Eve, Georgie James and her friends come up with a genius plan to help them stick to their resolutions… They all write down secrets, seal them in envelopes and then post them to each other. The secrets will be revealed at the end of the year if they haven’t kept their resolutions.
It’s perfect. Except…
Georgie’s secret is BIG… and revealing it could destroy their friendships. She has no idea why she chose that one to write down. There are plenty of innocent things she could have said – even admitting she finds newcomer Raf incredibly annoying would have been better.
What she does know is that there’s no way she can let her secret be revealed. Which means she needs to keep her (nightmare) resolutions and, most importantly, get her envelope back before anyone can open it. Which, given she sent her secret to Raf, means spending a lot more time with him than she’d choose to…
A heartwarming romance for fans of Beth O’Leary and Mhairi McFarlane.
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My Review
If you enjoy friendship ensemble dramas, then Can You Keep A Secret? is for you.
Yes, you will find it in the romantic comedy section — there are plenty of swoon-worthy moments, with multiple romances taking centre stage at different times. But Jo Lovett’s highly entertaining novel is, I think, better described as an emotion-charged comedy of errors spawned from the very best of intentions amongst a group of longtime friends in their 30s navigating love and life. So, in addition to romantic re-awakenings, it explores friendship, family, parenthood, careers, work-life balance and more.
The foreshadowed frisson between Georgie and Raf is one of the central story threads that delivers the romantic feels and great banter, along with unexpected depth given past traumas. Through another relationship central to the friend group, Lovett explores the challenges of first-time motherhood.
“He was just gazing at her as though she was someone very special, which she knew she wasn’t, but it felt lovely that someone would look at her that way.”
Lovett’s use of humour and first-person alternating character perspectives furthers her central character development and her readers’ engagement with them. It also ensures Can You Keep A Secret?’s pacing remains relatively swift, in spite of some stereotypical, and I guess fairly realistic, moments of character indecision and navel-gazing.
“Funny how – even when you still fancied them rotten like you always had and hankered so much after the good times (wonderful times) you used to have together – you could really start to almost dislike someone you used to love.”
Audiobook narration
A narrator sufficiently skilled to deliver character distinction without sounding outlandish can, in my experience, transform an ensemble dramedy novel into something even better in audiobook format. Narrator Harrie Dobby has done just that with Can You Keep A Secret. Her performance of comedic banter (timing and intonation) and the range of emotion displayed by female and male characters, all delivered within octaves I found pleasant on the ear, were integral to my enjoyment of this story.
For readers interested in romance classifications, this novel is far from ‘open-door’, including only very tangential references to ‘closed-door’ aspects. The story’s real focus is on the journey that leads to them.
I thoroughly enjoyed this warm-hearted friendship and romance drama from Jo Lovett, and recommend experiencing Can You Keep A Secret? in the audiobook format.
My Rating
Story 4 / 5 ; Writing 4 / 5 ; Narration 4 / 5
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* My receiving an audiobook copy of Can You Keep A Secret? from Libro.fm for review purposes did not impact the expression of my honest opinions above.