This post was originally published at Novelicious.com and is now at WritingTipsOasis.com. WritingTipsOasis.com acquired Novelicious.com in June 2022.
Reviewed by Jennifer Joyce
CC has a good job in advertising and a great circle of friends, but CC wants more. She dreams of finding Mr Right and settling down in the countryside and maybe starting a family. The problem is that CC has been single for two years, she only ever seems to meet gay men and she is rapidly approaching forty. Time is running out if she wants a baby so she starts to be proactive in her search for a boyfriend, going speed dating and taking more risks when meeting handsome new men.
The Case of the Missing Boyfriend isn’t your usual 'single girl hunting for Mr Right' kind of novel. The book is almost 400 pages long yet, despite claiming she wants to settle down and start a family, CC does very little to actually meet men and you can count the number of dates CC has on one hand. Despite her forties hurtling towards her and worrying about leaving it too long to have a baby, it doesn’t seem to give CC the motivation to do something about it. She meets a potential date at speed dating, but it doesn’t get off to a positive start, however, instead of returning to speed dating, CC gives up on the idea altogether.
I never really warmed to the character of CC, which meant I didn’t feel for her much during her plight. I didn’t feel much emotion from CC at the beginning of the book and it wasn’t until much later that I got to know her more in depth and learned about her past and by then it was too little, too late. I thought the beginning of the book dragged and didn’t pick up until CC went on a business trip to New York, which was almost a hundred pages in. It seemed like the hunt for a boyfriend would kick up a gear – and it did for a short while before petering out again. The book seemed more centred on CC’s work and her gay friends’ lives and even her mother’s love life was far more interesting than CC’s.
The Case of the Missing Boyfriend deals with some difficult issues, such as depression and death, but lacked any real romance or dating, which was a disappointment as I assumed CC would be more driven to fulfil her dreams and find the missing boyfriend.
6/10