This review is written with thanks to Penguin for my copy of Lies & Weddings via Netgalley.

Blurb:

Rufus Leung Gresham, future Earl of Greshamsbury and son of a former Hong Kong supermodel, is drowning in debt. The only solution, according to his mother, is for him to attend his sister’s wedding and seduce a woman with money.

Will it be the French hotel heiress with a royal bloodline? The venture capital genius who passes out billions like lollipops? Or will Rufus betray his family and confess his love for his best friend and ‘girl next door’ Eden? But when a volcanic eruption burns through the nuptials and a hot mic exposes a secret tryst, the Gresham family plans – and their reputation – go up in flames, making Rufus’ choice all the more impossible.

Taking us from the sand beaches of Hawaii to the skies of Marrakech, from the glitzy bachelor pads of Beverly Hills to the inner sanctums of England’s oldest family estates, Kevin Kwan has written a juicy, hilarious and sophisticated tale of love, money, murder, sex, and the lies we tell about them all.

Review:

I wasn’t really sure what to expect when I started Lies & Weddings but what I got was an absolute riot! I read the novel for an online book club and described it to them as Bridgerton on steroids! There’s romance, scandal, rivalry, lots of arguments and lots of fun and I really enjoyed getting to know these characters. Kevin Kwan writes in a humorous, lighthearted way that makes Lies & Weddings easy to read – I finished it in less than 24 hours – but there are also some more serious, but interesting issues for the reader to get their teeth into.

I would describe Lies & Weddings as a mostly character driven novel. There is a character list at the beginning of the book so that you can get to grips with who’s who and how they are related to each other, but I must admit that it still took me a while to get my head round it! Nevertheless, the characters are all individual and very well drawn and I was very easily brought into their lives and quickly became immersed in their problems!

Lies & Weddings has many different settings and each one is described in really clear detail. I felt like I was on a whistlestop tour of the world! The travel between times and places is marked really clearly at the beginning of each scene and I can see the novel would make a really entertaining Netflix series!

Beneath the bold exterior, Kevin Kwan actually explores a number of more serious issues in Lies & Weddings and as I got further into the novel, I enjoyed peeling back the layers and learning more about the things that had affected these characters and made them into the people we see in the novel. I actually felt quite emotional as some of these issues were revealed.

This is my first novel by Kevin Kwan but I shall certainly be looking out for more!

Lies & Weddings is available from Amazon.