Name: The Lemon Grove
ISBN: 9780345813961

Helen Walsh

Jenn and Greg are in Deia, a coastal village on an island off the southeast coast of Spain, on their annual holiday to enjoy languorous, close afternoons by the pool, and relaxed dinners overlooking the rocks. But the equilibrium is upset by the arrival of their teenage daughter, Emma, and her boyfriend, Nathan. Jenn, in her early forties, loves her husband and her (step)daughter and is content with her life, she thinks. But when this beautiful, reckless young man comes into her life, she is caught by a sexual compulsion that she's seldom felt since adolescence.

The Lemon Grove

Elisa Bieg

** spoiler alert **
           Thankfully I had only spent 1 pound on it, grabbed it off the shelves at a charity shop. Because had I spent more than that I would be even more disappointed — to put it mildly.
The main character, Jenn, is unlikable from the very beginning: she is bitchy and petty like a moody teenager, so is there any wonder that she takes it too far and end up hooking up with one (repeatedly)? This isn't about a meeting of minds, about finding someone you feel so connected with that you don't feel bound by societal and decency norms. No, this was tawdry, and just... Well, gross, frankly, because you cannot help but get caught up in the age difference and how their affair doesn't have any sentimental or even mental basis for it — there is no meeting of the minds, just sex for the sake of it, which is just... unappealing and pointless, not to mention uninteresting, as there is no depth to any of the characters, they are all marionettes. Worst read of the year for me, no doubt.

The Lemon Grove

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