Get A Life, Chloe Brown was one of those books that makes you look at your own life and either really appreciate it and those in it, or it makes you wanna go out and, as the title suggests, get a life!

GoodReads proclaims:

Chloe Brown is a chronically ill computer geek with a goal, a plan, and a list. After almost—but not quite—dying, she’s come up with seven directives to help her “Get a Life”, and she’s already completed the first: finally moving out of her glamorous family’s mansion. The next items?
• Enjoy a drunken night out.
• Ride a motorcycle.
• Go camping.
• Have meaningless but thoroughly enjoyable sex.
• Travel the world with nothing but hand luggage.
• And… do something bad.
But it’s not easy being bad, even when you’ve written step-by-step guidelines on how to do it correctly. What Chloe needs is a teacher, and she knows just the man for the job.
Redford ‘Red’ Morgan is a handyman with tattoos, a motorcycle, and more sex appeal than ten-thousand Hollywood heartthrobs. He’s also an artist who paints at night and hides his work in the light of day, which Chloe knows because she spies on him occasionally. Just the teeniest, tiniest bit.
But when she enlists Red in her mission to rebel, she learns things about him that no spy session could teach her. Like why he clearly resents Chloe’s wealthy background. And why he never shows his art to anyone. And what really lies beneath his rough exterior…

If you know me, then you know that I ADORE books centering around interracial couples so this definitely caught my eye as I walked around Prince Books (it also didn’t hurt that the main character is a plus size woman). I also appreciated that it was written by a black woman because we love supporting African American and female authors. So let’s dive in!

So as soon as I started reading GALCB, I realized that the book was British! After traveling to Berlin and reading some of the books that are popular in Europe, I discovered a newfound love for European realistic fiction. These books often delve into topics that aren’t always touched on in American literature which make them a great way to learn more about the area and while still diving into a juicy narrative. So if you’re looking to expand your reading atlas, I’d definitely recommend this book.

From the first description of the title character, Chloe Brown, I realized that I had found the 31 year-old British version of myself. Chloe comes from a family that has money but decides to venture out on her own after a near death experience to “get a life”. The book describes her as a prim list lover with a princess-like attitude and a sharp tongue to match. Essentially, she’s bougie. One of my favorite phrases used to describe her was “[…] grumpiness was high on her list of hobbies”. However, she also suffers from fibromyalgia which causes her chronic pain. The complexities of Chloe’s character were so beautiful and real. Due to her disease, Chloe guards herself and is blatantly aware of this. Chloe’s awareness was very refreshing because other characters I’ve read tend to be ignorant of their defense mechanisms until it is pointed out to them.

GALCB took the classic hate-love approach, with both of the main characters having an outward disdain for each other while on the inside they’re both crushing pretty hard. While this approach is, in my opinion, a bit overused, it worked well for this narrative because it gave the characters the space to have a deeper understanding of each other. It also built up the sexual tension.

SPEAKING OF WHICH! This book was SO much more sexual than I had anticipated. Not gonna lie, I really felt like I was reading 50 Shades of Gray at certain points. This mainly had two big effects on me. First off, it made me feel like I was reading an adult book for the first time (which is absurd since I’ve been reading adult books for at least five years now) and it also made me appreciate the female author. When Hibbert described Chloe’s body and reactions and thoughts, it felt extremely realistic. It felt really empowering for me because plus sized women’s sexuality isn’t something that is focused on a lot in the literary world. Chloe had actual curves and complications to her body just like the majority of women do so to see that not just mentioned but praised and analyzed was amazing to see. On the opposite side, Red’s thoughts and lust for Chloe was clearly a satire of how men write about women and there were times where I literally burst out laughing at some of Red’s thoughts and comments. Hibbert writes that Red “cracked like a perverted egg”, and “drank in every detail like some sexually depraved Victorian bloke” when looking or thinking about Chloe. While it was comical to read Red’s reactions to Chloe, it was refreshing and reassuring to see this character who “has more sex appeal than ten-thousand Hollywood heartthrobs” love and lust a character who does not fit into societal beauty standards.

Hibbert does a fantastic job at addressing other social issues as well and one that she covers extremely well is losing and finding oneself. When we meet Chloe and Red they are both living very different lives than they used to and they’re both trying to come to terms with exactly what that means and how to move forward. Throughout the book, Hibbert relays the message that it’s okay to become someone different and to lose yourself, especially through this quote:

“So he had his answer. He’d lost himself. He took a moment to breath through that realization, to sit with the finality of it. Oddly, it didn’t choke him. In fact, knowing it once and for all felt a little like lifting a weight”

Hibbert

Another social construct Hibbert addresses are male and female friendships. Red’s best friend Vik, is constantly challenging him to open up about the hurt and emotions that Red is feeling when he tries to close himself up which is something Red tends to do a lot. The stereotype that men don’t talk about their feelings because they’re too tough or masculine can be really damaging and foster a toxic masculinity as well so seeing Hibbert create a characters that attempt to break the cycle is really stimulating. On the other side, Hibbert also writes about the experience of clubbing for girls and expands on the camaraderie that is built when going to the club with your girls. In one scene, Chloe goes to the club to fulfill one of the items on her “Get a Life” List. As she’s there she realizes that clubs were only fun because of the accompaniment of her friends. Hibbert writes, “It wasn’t about drinking and partying in some dingy club. It had been about the people. The constant laughter they shared, too high on each other to care that they were being obnoxious”. I related so heavily to this in remembering nights at the club with my own friends and how the real party was being with each other and not necessarily with randos we found at the club [though sometimes the randos can be fun to ;)].

One of the last things that I’ll note on is how this book addresses what I like to call: sexual saviorism, or the idea that sex can fix or is the solution to any issue. While sex can be relaxing, exhilarating, fun, *insert adjective of your choice here*, there are things that cannot simply be sexed away. In a lot of romance novels, it can often seem as though the opposite is true and sex can be used as a universal panacea. Hibbert makes it very clear that while sex is fun, there are some things that cannot be solved through simple lust which was one of the things that made this romance novel really click to me.

Though I really enjoyed this book overall, the beginning was a little slow and sometimes the writing style was a little awkward to read. However, these notes are minor compared to the overall message and themes that the book portrays. I give it a solid 4/5!

If you wanna check out Get A Life, Chloe Brown for yourself, click here!