Review: The Ex Next Door by Jo Platt
You’ll know by now that it was the bright colours and general cuteness of this cover that prompted me to request it. I do also enjoy a bit of drama between exes, so I was looking forward to seeing if this one was any good.
Esme co-owns an art gallery with her business partner David but when her flat is destroyed by a burst pipe, she has no choice but to temporarily move into a cottage. However, she didn’t plan on her new neighbours being none other than Elliot, the man she broke up with years ago, and his new partner. Deciding to keep their shared past a secret, Esme and Elliot struggle through awkward encounters and relationships start to be questioned.
Esme is pretty insecure and I’m afraid I didn’t gel with her at all. I felt she was creating drama on little evidence and she seemed like she’d been a nightmare girlfriend during her relationship with Elliot. In the years between their break up and their reunion, she clearly had grown but I still couldn’t make that connection that I love to have with romantic heroines.
Of course, seeing Elliot again brings back a lot of feelings for her and it seems that it might be the same for him. The fact that he has a very sweet, completely oblivious girlfriend meant that it was infuriating to watch Esme entertain the idea of picking things back up with him. I have no idea why Esme started meeting Elliot alone. At no point did I root for them and clearly, I wasn’t supposed to.
Lloyd was the main source of comedy in the novel and I did find myself smiling away at his buffoonery. However, I’m not sure I’d describe the book as ‘laugh-out-loud’, which the marketing claims it is.
I was very taken aback by the ending because I didn’t see it coming at all and it felt really out of place. I can’t go into the details because of spoilers but it just didn’t feel right at all and I’d have liked a lot more warning and build-up to it, if that was how things were going to end up.
The Ex Next Door could have been a fun rom-com with flawed but loveable characters. As it was, it took a long time for things to actually start happening and the heroine really wasn’t my kind of girl at all. It was mildly funny in places but there are definitely better romances out there with the same tropes.
