Don’t You Forget About Me: A Novel

Romantic comedy can either be the best or worst entertainment, and Don’t You Forget About Me by Mhairi McFarlane falls into the former category.

Georgiana’s night keeps getting worse—first getting fired from her waitressing job, at arguably the worst bar in Sheffield, then walking in on her boyfriend in bed with someone else, both of them covered in Ben and Jerry’s. Things seem on the up when she snares another job (what isn’t up after that, right?), until an old flame walks in, the boy she fell for hard twelve years ago, and who (apparently) doesn’t remember her at all.

Don’t You Forget About Me is a wonderful, light read. But just because Georgiana is an entertaining narrator and Lucas, her crush, is appropriately hot, don’t let that fool you into thinking this is a fluff novel. In true McFarlane fashion, superficially light themes take readers to deep, even dark, places, and the effect is a novel that discusses big issues, even traumatic ones, with wacky fun along the way. Warning: readers may find themselves seeking out more McFarlane novels, as with their ribald adventures and heroines armed with a sharply-honed wit, they are more addictive than a certain potato chip, and stopping at one would be unthinkable.