Review: The Switch

The Switch
By Beth O’Leary

Published By: Quercus
Publication Date: April 16, 2020
Date Read: March 27, 2022
Genre: Adult – Contemporary
Source: Bought
Format: Paperback
Pages: 336

From Goodreads:
Eileen is sick of being 79.
Leena’s tired of life in her twenties.
Maybe it’s time they swapped places…

When overachiever Leena Cotton is ordered to take a two-month sabbatical after blowing a big presentation at work, she escapes to her grandmother Eileen’s house for some overdue rest. Eileen is newly single and about to turn eighty. She’d like a second chance at love, but her tiny Yorkshire village doesn’t offer many eligible gentlemen.

Once Leena learns of Eileen’s romantic predicament, she proposes a solution: a two-month swap. Eileen can live in London and look for love. Meanwhile Leena will look after everything in rural Yorkshire. But with gossiping neighbours and difficult family dynamics to navigate up north, and trendy London flatmates and online dating to contend with in the city, stepping into one another’s shoes proves more difficult than either of them expected.

Leena learns that a long-distance relationship isn’t as romantic as she hoped it would be, and then there is the annoyingly perfect – and distractingly handsome – school teacher, who keeps showing up to outdo her efforts to impress the local villagers. Back in London, Eileen is a huge hit with her new neighbours, but is her perfect match nearer home than she first thought?

“I know he was good to you when you needed him. But you don’t stay with somebody out of gratitude. That’s not how you do it.”

Where do I even start with this review? The Switch is another absolute masterpiece by Beth O’Leary! I am not usually one for contemporary novels. I am a fantasy reader through and through. By there is just something about Beth’s books that grips me right from the start and won’t let me go. I loved her debut novel The Flat Share, that I read last year and I was excited to see what she was going to do next. The Switch is even better. This book is just absolutely phenomenal.

The Switch follows Leena, a young twenty-something who is struggling to come to terms with the death of her beloved sister. Unable to cope with her grief, she is given two months sabbatical from work in order to work on herself. Her and her post-divorce grandmother Eileen decide to switch places. Leena will stay in the countryside and rest, and her grandmother is going to live it big in London, and try out the online dating scene. What could possibly go wrong?

This book is a freaking masterpiece. Right from the first page, I was hooked and I couldn’t put it down. I read this book in a day. Once I got into it, I fell head over heels for the two leads. They are so different from each other and that worked brilliantly. You have grieving Leena, who is serious and struggles to spend time by herself… and then you have Eileen, over the top with no fucks to give… I loved Eileen so much. Everyone needs an Eileen in their life. She is just hilarious!

The Switch deals with some really hard hitting issues. Death, grief and moving on. In more than one sense. Leena is struggling to move on after the loss of her sister. Eileen is determined to move on as she finds herself single at age 79. It was such a beautiful and heartwarming read. I absolutely adored everything about it.

Beth O’Leary has firmly cemented her place on my auto-buy author list. I am not sure there is anything this woman can’t write. I absolutely adore her phenomenal storytelling skills. I am so excited to pick up her next book (which is already sat waiting on my shelf). I just adore her and I can’t wait to see what she writes next. The Switch is without a doubt a must-read for everyone.

“You deserve to be with somebody who makes you feel more yourself. Not less.”

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