When Tori Miller’s boyfriend dumps her in the cab ride home from her best friend’s wedding she is devastated and undergoes a severe downturn. She has no life to speak of for the next two years until her friends, seeing how far she has gotten away from her old self, stage an intervention. Jerry and Jimmy manage to snag her a spot in the pilot for a reality television make over show, promising her that it will never see the light of day, which will serve the much needed dual purpose of giving Tori’s confidence a boost and garnering an important job for Tori’s burgeoning promotion ad agency MillerWorks. Alice, Tori’s best friend, arranges a spot for her in a summer share in the Hamptons.
Tori arrive late at the Hamptons Share House meeting and for some reason the house organizer, Leah, refuses to call her anything but Miller as it appears on her e-mail and the nickname sticks. She meets her other housemates Cassie, Stacy, Mike, Andrew and Jackson; before she knows it she is jet-setting and attending fabulous parties, flirting up a storm and trying to keep up with all the written and unwritten rules of the Hamptons. Of course everune know that her secret make over is probably going to come back to bite her in the butt in some way, shape or form; the only question is when and how?
Though not normally my style Lovehampton was a pleasure to read. Tori is interesting and accessible and it is easy to sympathize and understand how she loses herself after the sudden way that her boyfriend breaks up with her. You are rooting for er to gp out and have a lot of fun and get things together. I loved the relationships that she had with her friends Jerry, Jimmy and Alice. The way they talked with each other and had real conversations about the issues in their lives and their relationships was wonderful. “Miller” also shows a lot of growth as she struggles to balance the ego boost that her makeover has given her with the person that she truly is.
I was surprised in the romance department as Tori meets and mingles with not only the men in her house, but also wealthy real estate mogul, George Daniels. Her relationship with each guy was so different that it was fun to see them all develop and then zero in on the one that I actually wanted to work out for Tori. Of course as soon as you figure out which guy you want for her, hijinks and misunderstandings rain down and make there ever getting together seem all but possible. There were lots of humurous situations in this book as I recognized a lot of the beach house “rules” and party scenarios. It was a great escape for me since New York has been rather unseasonably rainy this year. Lovehampton is the closest that I have gotten to the beach this summer.
The first person narrative was refreshing, fun and alternately embarrassing depending upon the situation in which Tori found herself. I really felt as if I were right there experiencing everything with her. I can’t say that I didn’t know exactly how this book would end, but it’s one of those things where you wouldn’t have it any other way.
