# Hot Mess

By Lucy Vine

Profile: https://hahafiction.com/books/hot-mess-ac19d88c/

Ellie Knight’s friends are settling down, and the people around her have opinions about her failure to follow suit. She has enough to dislike already in her job and her shared home. As pressure to find a partner sends her on bad dates, Ellie has to reckon with how much she values being single.

## What makes it funny?

Ellie’s Tinder disappointments have competition at home: her father is dating again, discovering cocktails and sending emails that contain his attempts at erotic fiction. Trying to manage her own romantic life does little to prepare her for reading about his.

### The comedy at work

The expectation that Ellie should pair off keeps pushing her into embarrassing situations. Vine spreads the awkwardness across generations, letting a parent’s new interests intrude on a daughter already tired of everyone’s advice about relationships.

### Try this if…

Ellie is a deliberately flawed, sometimes difficult heroine who values single life. Readers interested in a woman resisting the approved timetable for settling down have a reason to follow her beyond the succession of bad dates.

### Good to know

Dirty jokes and excerpts from a father’s erotic manuscript share space with maternal bereavement.

## What to expect

- Genre: Contemporary & literary · Romance
- On the shelf: Contemporary romance · Romantic comedy
- Kind of humor: Situational comedy
- The atmosphere: Irreverent
- Audience: Adult
- Format: Novel
- Length: 304 pages (ebook)
- Published: 2017

## A few distinguishing details

- A heroine who values being single
- Bad Tinder dates and a father discovering dating again
- Emails containing a parent’s amateur erotic fiction

## Sources & further reading

- Book information: [Apple Books lists Hot Mess by Lucy Vine as an ebook with a length of 304 pages.](https://books.apple.com/us/book/hot-mess/id1241871487)
- Review: [Books with Jane review](https://bookswithjane.wordpress.com/2017/06/25/review-hot-mess-lucy-vine)
- Author commentary: [Author commentary](https://www.femalefirst.co.uk/books/lucy-vine-hot-mess-1073332.html)
- Book information: [Bibliographic listing](https://www.fantasticfiction.com/v/lucy-vine/hot-mess.htm)
- Publisher: [Publisher](https://www.orionbooks.co.uk/titles/lucy-vine/hot-mess/9781409172215)