The Flatshare

Score: 5/5 Bookmarks

Steam Rating: 🍆🍆/5

Why did it take me so long to pick up The Flatshare by Beth O’Leary? It was so good. So good. The characters are silly, and nerdy, and neurotic and completely love-able.

Tiffy (our leading lady) needs to move out of her ex-boyfriend’s flat…like yesterday. But she works in publishing for a pittance and can’t afford a place of her own. So she answers an ad for a flatshare, where the other occupant (Leon) is a night nurse and will only be home while Tiffy is at work. The catch is…there is only one bedroom, and one bed. So they’ll take turns having the place all to themselves, and never actually meet. What could possibly go wrong?

The book is sweet, and romantic, and hilarious but it actually deals with some tough topics too (emotional abuse, hospice care, mental health etc). Having said that, it will make you laugh out-loud (a lot) and have you rooting for the main characters the whole way through. You get to watch Tiffy and Leon grow and deal with their baggage to become healthier, more well-rounded people, which is extremely satisfying rather than being frustrating (as it sometimes is to read about characters who really don’t have their sh*t together). I’d say The Flatshare is ultimately a hopeful story, of overcoming obstacles, believing in yourself, creating your own family, and finding your person (in the most unlikely of ways).

I highly recommend this one, especially on audiobook. It was so wonderfully narrated by Carrie Hope Fletcher and Kwaku Fortune and you can grab it by clicking the button below, or get the physical copy here.

Synopsis:

Tiffy and Leon share a flat
Tiffy and Leon share a bed
Tiffy and Leon have never met…

Tiffy Moore needs a cheap flat, and fast. Leon Twomey works nights and needs cash. Their friends think they’re crazy, but it’s the perfect solution: Leon occupies the one-bed flat while Tiffy’s at work in the day, and she has the run of the place the rest of the time.

But with obsessive ex-boyfriends, demanding clients at work, wrongly imprisoned brothers and, of course, the fact that they still haven’t met yet, they’re about to discover that if you want the perfect home you need to throw the rulebook out the window…