The Husband Maker by Karey White

Charlotte is a real romantic; she wants a man to fall madly in love with her and settle down with her forever. But in reality, this doesn’t seem to be happening. In fact, the men that Charlotte dates ARE settling down and getting married, but it always seems to be to whoever they start dating after they break up with her.

She is not alone in noticing the pattern, in fact, at her latest ex-boyfriend’s wedding, she overhears a conversation in the ladies’ where she finds out that she is referred to behind her back as ‘The Husband Maker’. Obviously Charlotte is really upset by this, but being an optimist as well as a romantic, Charlotte allows herself to be set up with Kyle. This time she’s hopeful that her luck will change, and if not, she will have helped Kyle find love somewhere else.

‘Inside I surrendered. I was a hopeless failure at finding love for myself. I might as well try to help someone else. Especially a desperate old guy. “Fine, Jayne. Go ahead and set it up. But promise you won’t hate me when it doesn’t work out and he’s still a bachelor four or five girls from now.”

There is a lot to like about Charlotte. She is a good sister, a loving daughter and a wonderful friend, especially to her close friend Angus. She has a great sense of humour too, and is very modest and self-deprecating. But she’s so fixated on getting married, I couldn’t help but wonder how much this desperation at breaking her unlucky trend was pushing boyfriends away. She also wouldn’t turn the offer of a date down in case he was ‘the one’. Charlotte comes a long way in learning the truth of something she read:

‘The only way to true happiness is to know yourself-your hopes, your desires, your abilities and your limitations.’

Usually, if a character goes through a journey of self-discovery, they will have had a trying time, and this is true for Charlotte. I felt sorry for her for the difficulties she was going through, sometimes she was a bit naive, but other times I could completely understand her feelings on the changes being pushed onto her life once Kyle makes moves towards fulfilling his political ambitions. Her treatment at the hands of journalists made me really quite angry on her behalf! Charlotte has to decide what she is willing to sacrifice going forward:

‘They were choreographing my life. And I’m not a good dancer.’

This is the first in a series, followed by ‘The Match Maker’ and ‘The Wife Maker’, which all focus on Charlotte, so her tale isn’t fully told in this book. It ends on a question which is clearly leading you towards book two to find out what happens in the next episode in Charlotte’s life. I had decided pretty early on in ‘The Husband Maker’ where I think this is going, so I suppose I’ll have to read the other books to find out if I’m correct in my predictions!

I hadn’t read any books by this author before. I really enjoyed her writing style, and I found it easy to get absorbed in the story. I found at some points there were a lot of characters introduced at once, which sometimes got a little confusing. Also, some characters weren’t used much, which makes me wonder whether they will have side storylines in the other books in the series. Although this book deals with romantic relationships there are no sex scenes, and I don’t think that sex is even referred to so any blushes you might have when reading will be down to something embarrassing happening to poor Charlotte! If you’re looking for a romantic read with a happy ever after, this book doesn’t have it, though the series as a whole may have. However, I enjoyed getting to know the characters and seeing Charlotte come to a better understanding of who she is and what she wants from life. I’d rate this book as a 4 star read.

*I received an e-book of this story for my honest review.