The Wish List by Sophia Money-Coutts | Review

Have you ever written a wish list? A list of things you wish for your life? A list of qualities that a potential partner needs to have? I think everyone has one of those lists, probably in their head and not written out. I know I have one. My wants and needs from myself, my life and a potential partner. Would I ever write it out? Probably not. However, this is what Flo had to do in The Wish List by Sophia Money-Coutts and it seems to have worked.

Florence Fairfax is happy with her life. She works at a small bookshop in London, has a cat called Marmelade and a good relationship with her dad, stepmum and half-sisters. What more does a woman need? Well, according to her stepmum Patricia, Flo needs a man as well. When her half-sister Mia gets engaged to Hugo, Patricia decides that it is time to fix Flo’s relationship problem. The problem being that Flo has never been in a relationship at all.

So Patricia sets up an appointment for Flo with a love coach named Gwendolyn, who makes her write out a wish list of qualities she wants to have in a potential partner. Flo doesn’t take the list seriously, but writes it nonetheless. After the appointment a handsome man named Rory shows up at her bookshop who seems to fit all the criteria from the wish list. But is he really the one? Or just too good to be true?

Sophia Money-Coutts is always doing a good job with her protagonists. You can always root for them, feel for them and, most importantly, relate to them. Flo is no difference. She loves books, is an introvert, she is honest and loyal. Her insecurities over her love life, her anxiety and the whole love coach thing are very relatable, at least to me. What I love about Flo is that she is very aware of this and does everything she can to deal with that. She attends an anxiety support group to help with her anxiety and talks with her friends about her insecurities.

I also love Flo’s family dynamics and think that Money-Coutts has a knack for writing good, healthy family dynamics. In The Plus One the protagonist had a single mum, in What Happens Now? it was a loving mother and loving stepdad, in The Wish List it is a loving stepmum, loving half-sisters and loving, but absent, dad, due to his job. Obviously, not everything is perfect, but Flo and her half-sisters Mia and Ruby always have each other’s back and are a great trio.

There is also a subplot about saving the bookshop from having to close after a rent hike that shows Flo’s passion for her job and her boss. She gets help from her colleague Eugene and her boss’ nephew Zack, as well as her older and sometimes clueless boss. I loved the dynamic at the bookshop and would absolutely start shopping at this particular bookshop all the time, if it were living in London and the bookshop wasn’t fictional. I definitely daydreamed about visiting while i was reading the book.

While Gwendolyn was incredibly eccentric, I would honestly be super curious to visit a love coach like her as well. It would probably be really interesting to hear what Gwendolyn would say about me. Honestly, I would just go for that alone.

Sophia Money-Coutts’ writing style is as enganging and witty as ever and I enjoyed it immensely. The ending was somewhat predictable, but there were definitely some details that I would not have seen coming, but that enforced my feeling about the super-sister-trio and why I love them so much. All that is left to ask for now is a sequel that focuses on either Mia or Ruby or to make two sequels and give one to each sister.

I think it goes without saying that I highly recommend The Wish List, especially for fans of British humour and British rom coms. Have You read The Wish List? What did you think? Would you be interested in visiting a love coach? I would love to hear your thoughts about this.

Information:
Title: The Wish List
Author: Sophia Money-Coutts
Pages: 400
Publisher: HQ
Publishing Date (first publication): 06-08-2020