Friday, 2 May 2014

The Love Sucks Club by Beth Burnett




After a terrible tragedy and heartbreak, Dana McComb moves to a beautiful Caribbean island where she becomes a bit of a loner. Feeling nothing but numbness is the only way Dana can stop the visions she’s been having about the death of her soul mate, Fran.
 
Dana had a rebound relationship that failed dismally. So, she’s even more determined to hunker down in her isolated house on the top of a hill. Dana’s only companion is her middle aged, Maine Coon Tom cat, Frank. She’s determined to live a quiet and uneventful life.
 
Dana and her best friend Sam, start up The Love Sucks Club. A club which enables them and their friends to sit around moaning about their pitiful, almost non existent love lives.
 
Dana’s state of misery gradually begins to subside when her younger sister and a few of the islanders start interfering in her life and her plans for being a hermit are slowly ousted.
 
When a new woman arrives on the island, Dana’s visions return with a vengeance. Suddenly, hallucinations, nightmares and panic attacks are an everyday occurrence. Dana wonders if she is going insane.
 
Dana’s attempts at shutting out her past are failing. She has to do something and soon. She begins on a journey to put her dead lover to rest, knowing it could either be a life saver or a complete disaster, making matters worse.
 
A nicely written book full of humor and beautifully set on a Caribbean island. From the well defined descriptions, I totally lost myself in with the characters and lived the story with them and I was hooked in from the first page.
 
Dana and her best friend Sam play the biggest parts in this story. Both are well developed and multidimensional. They are backed up by a great cast of secondary characters all interacting well together. Characters I could easily identify with and think of as friends.
 
The story mainly follows Dana as she tries to get over the loss of her lover. Without adding any spoilers, all sorts of ups and downs and twists and turns occur throughout. Emotions boil over one minute, followed by gut aching laughter the next.
 
Life on the island is never dull and Dana’s futile attempts at being a hermit are thwarted at every turn. Until eventually, The Love Sucks Club goes from bitching about the lack of love it’s member are experiencing, to actually having the hope of love to come.
 
This is an extraordinary original story, one which will stay with me a long time. Totally different from Beth’s first two books. I would have liked to have seen a bit more of Dana’s life after the hurricane. But, maybe that’s for another book, hopefully.
 

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