This is my second book (audiobook, actually) by Kiki Archer, and it was as delightful as the first one (But She Is My Student).
Connie Parker’s life revolves around her three-year-old son Noah, a fact her boyfriend Karl fails to understand. Yet, while she loves her son more than anything, she’s sometimes bored with her daily life, and so decides to take writing as a hobby. She doesn’t believe in love (how could she, trying to make a family with a man she only dated for a couple of months before she got pregnant?), but Bonnie, her alter ego, does. Then Connie meets the beautiful and mysterious Maria, another mother at play group, and finds out life isn’t as straightforward as she thought.
Too Late… I Love You is ridiculously funny (sometimes in a very bitchy way, which gives it a guilty pleasure feel) and incredibly cute at the same time. The pedal-cart / scooter chase in Brighton had me trying not to laugh out loud in the street. There’s a hilarious gallery of secondary characters, most notably Connie’s best friend Ryan. He’s both the best and worst friend. While he and Connie were shopping, I was screaming in my head (I was on the tram by then) to Connie, “don’t listen to him, you’ve got fingers, sweetie!” As for the main characters, the interaction between Connie and Maria is wonderful from the start, and the chemistry is obvious.
The audiobook is exquisitely narrated by Ella Lynch, whose narration of A.E. Radley’s The Road Ahead I’d also enjoyed very much (plus, I’m always impressed by a narrator who manages to make children voices sound real), and I have the feeling Kiki Archer’s books work really well in audio, what with the quirky characters and entertaining dialogue. I hope I’ll get a chance to listen to another one soon.
Jude in the Stars 