🌹Book Review🌹

Love in Lockdown by Chloe James

How does one find love in the middle of a pandemic? Love in Lockdown is about Jack and Sophia who live in the same flat in the UK and are trying to navigate their lives during the lockdown at the beginning of the pandemic. I was hoping to like this book but I feel like it was very dialogue heavy and often times it was hard to tell who was speaking to whom. Other times the story seemed to bounce around after a quick conversation with one of the other characters. Also I think there author really liked "Love is Blind" on Netflix because it was mentioned multiple times throughout the book and it seems to be somewhat of an underlying theme to the book itself. It was an interesting concept and I think most people can relate due to the pandemic but I think it missed the mark.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for letting me read an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Overall rating: ⭐⭐

"It's a weird fact that in this world, sometimes you can feel alone even when you're together."

The lockdown has been going on for about two weeks when Sophia steps out into her balcony to participate in the NHS clap to recognize and show support for the frontline workers. Touched by the overwhelming sound of everyone coming together, Sophia can't help but cry. She hears a voice calling to her from above, asking if she's okay. And so begins this beautiful novel about finding love and hope during quarantine.

"In lockdown, nothing was definite, nothing was certain except the strength and resilience of love and community."

It was very strange, at first, to read a book about something we've all gone through. The quarantine affected each of us differently, so it was interesting to see what the author choose to highlight or not. Parts of this gave me chills because they were so relatable. Sophia's sister was planning a wedding before lockdown, so she changed over her plans to Zoom. Reading the wedding scene made me tear up. My friends & I had a standing Zoom happy hour every Friday, and it was one of my favorite things about quarantine. The phone calls, the checking in, the rainbows... it was all there. And, underneath all of that, there was an adorable love story of two people navigating our new normal in the best way they could. Sophia and Jack don't know what the other looks like almost the entire novel because of Jack's kidney disease and other circumstances that just don't allow it to happen, so their balcony chats were everything. Admittedly, the book felt a bit long and repetitive at times; Sophia is damaged from a past relationship and it's a lot "can't-trust-any-man" going on, but I still truly enjoyed this quarantined love story.

I was sceptical about a book written about lockdown. There have been a lot of debates on social media about whether we would really want to read about lockdown when we are looking for escapism in our reading matter.
I have to say Love in Lockdown really won me over and I enjoyed this sweet, reflective look at the lockdown earlier this year. It has a sleepless in Seattle vibe to it as Jack lives over Sophia’s apartment but due to medical condition he his shielding so they can not meet. They get chatting one night after the weekly claps on the balcony. Their lives like many others are on pause and lockdown gives them space to think about what they really want from life. The book also looks at themes of community and the people who were most affected by lockdown. It also picks up on how at a time of worry and fear people rallied around to help.
It was a very enjoyable read and I did not feel depressed, but it helped me think about some of the positives from this very strange era. I was also impressed at how quickly and beautifully written this novel was to be produced in such a short amount of time.
Do not be put off by the title even if you have had enough of 2020 to last you a lifetime. This is a lovely, easy read which will put a smile on your face despite the subject matter!

This was a cute story to follow along. I liked how relatable the storyline was. The characters were sweet to follow along as well.

A lovely feel good love story to curl up in front of the fire on a cold lock-down evening. Lockdown is a huge part of all our lives at the moment and this book made you aware of all the problems people less fortunate are having to go through. It shows that community spirit can overcome most of our day to day problems, it was a lovely warm well written book.

I really thought this was a cute book, but I think it’s going to be too soon for many people. I thought everyone making the best of the situation was really fun and heart warming.

Thank you Netgalley for providing me a free copy of this book in exchange for a honest review.


What I liked ?

First of all I was so fascinated by the title of the book ,I requested it .


I loved the concept of the book ,love in lockdown. We keep on hearing about romance books but this book was something different.

I have read many romance books in the pandemic period but this book was something appropriate for this weather.

I obviously loved our main characters or protagonists of the story Jack and Sophie .The relationship Jack has with his friends is good.


What I Hated?

I would have liked it more if they could have more physical time together.

Seeing the current situation meeting everyone physically is not possible.


Secondly, the fact that Jack hides that he is already married was beyond shock to me .I didn't see it coming at all .



Final Thoughts :If you are fan of rom com read this and find it yourself if this suits you

I rated this 3 stars due to the plot behind the book being intriguing enough. I wanted to like this story. I found it more on the boring side. Sophia lives in a flat with her best friend as her roommate. Jack lives in the flat above her. Covid is currently happening and everyone is on lockdown. Jack cannot leave due to medical issues. Sophia is a teacher and has a small class of six kids during this time. They start talking out on their balconies and form a friendship, though they've never met. They soon develop feelings for each other. Now here are the two things I'm going to discuss as to why the book didn't live up to it's potential...
1. Uncle Jim. This character didn't need to be in the story or even talked about so many bloody times. He had no purpose in the plotline.
2. I can understand the two main characters developing attraction and possibly feelings towards each other. However, they had no clue as to what each other looked like and had only been chatting outside to each other for I'm guessing a couple of months, if that. Then all of a sudden the story is ending and they love each other. This insta love pops up out of nowhere and they're telling each other they love them. I don't buy it. 🤷‍♀️

As posted on Goodreads and Instagram as @brews4books, where I pair books and beers!

📖: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ ~ This book was absolutely adorable. I was fortunate enough to read an advanced copy on NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Love in Lockdown is the story of two young adults who live in a small apartment community. When the global pandemic begins, and everyone is staying home, they spark a friendship while chatting on their balconies. This book honors the seriousness and complexity of the global pandemic we are living through while also celebrating the sense of community that was built and the importance of supporting one another...even from a distance.
🍺: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ ~ Most people will agree that the quarantines and stay at home orders that were put in place for most of the spring season had a lot of challenges. One thing that brought some joy and excitement to our “new normal” was the informal beer exchange that my friends and I enjoyed during those long, stressful months. This is one of the beers that @luckiecharm1018 shared with me. It is light and crisp and felt like a beer version of one of Jack’s balcony mocktails.
@avon_books @harpercollins @f.woodifield @netgalley @leinenkugels #ChloeJames #LoveInLockdown #JackAndSophie4Ever #BalconyLove #RomCom #NetGalley #ARC #LeinenkugelsSpritzen #RaspberryLemon #BeerExchange #CookBOOKClub #goodbooksgoodbrews

This book is exactly what we hope happens to us in a lockdown, a love story indeeed!! But not everybody gets lucky like our protagonists, so we live vicariously through them. A very sweet romantic read to cheer you up if you are having a bad week.

Thank you to NetGalley and Avon Books UK for giving me an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Real rating: 3,5/5⭐

I went in to this book with mixed feelings. Could anyone really do the lockdown love story good?
I was pleasently surprised by the story and the charming characters though! I really liked the premise of the story.

Sadly the style wasn't really my favorite, kind of repetitive and missing some good plot points.

Overall a cute story with warm and loving characters, but not checking all my boxes for a good romance sadly.

The blurb of this book seemed interesting especially because of what's happening right now, but sadly I couldn't really connect with the story or the characters. Since Jack and Sophia were spending all their time home, the story turned out to be a bit boring. They were only able to see each other for the first time at the very end of the book and it wasn't very credible with all the technology we have now... I couldn't feel the chemistry between Jack and Sophia.

Actual rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

Love in Lockdown is the perfect read for those still stuck in quarantine because of the pandemic (like me lol). It comforts you because you get to read about all these experiences people are also possibly having in real life because of the pandemic. It’s nice to know that we are all going through this together!

“…when everything else stops, love is all that’s left.”

I think this line perfectly describes Love in Lockdown for me. Everything that happened is all connected to caring and showing your love for other people. I really liked how nice to read this book was. I wish our community where I’m from is like this as well. Would be nice to sing and enjoy music with other people! (while socially distancing LOL)

I also liked the romance side. I LOVED the suspense of the two main characters not being able to see each other. The near misses had me screaming!!! A sweet and light read but I definitely wish we got more from the ending.

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

I have had mixed feelings about COVID/quarantine romances, and just decided ultimately that people are entitled to feel how they want about them, I was just tired of seeing it being used as a vehicle for forced proximity, something that (depending on the other trope involved), I don’t like anyway. But while I groaned to see a publisher already cashing in on the trend, I was mildly intrigued to see it was about people who fall in love with distance between them, and the cover imagery evoked one of the plotlines from the Love in the Time of Corona TV series, one of the factors in my decision to be more open minded to COVID romance if the premise appealed.

However, this book fell way short of expectations. For one (although it’s not the only factor), it’s dual first person present tense. While there are subheadings, I would frequently forget who I was meant to be following (and while I know this has no bearing on the final product, it was even worse with the initial PDF ARC, which was so poorly formatted, it didn’t make those shifts distinct…but thankfully they did update it to a mobi/ePub formats at some point between when I initially was approved and now).

And the characters and their lives are just plain uninteresting. Their interactions with each other have some spark, but given the way the story is set up, I feel there just wasn’t enough to merit a full on novel, especially having read a collection of quarantine stories earlier that I believe handled the balance of the mundane and exciting much better. There are attempts at side plots, but I just never grabbed onto anyone enough to care.

As a first attempt at a traditionally published quarantine romance, I feel it missed the mark.. However, I do commend Chloe James for trying to do justice to this crazy time, even if it didn’t work for me. It has received mixed reviews, and there’s actually a lot more positive than I expected, given the polarizing response I’ve seen from people on the topic, so I think if it appeals to you, give it a try for yourself.

This was a cute romantic read! It was interesting to read a book set in this current pandemic, but it got a bit boring with the constant mentioning of distancing and other Coronavirus policies. Especially as it made it out that everyone was constantly following the rules to the letter. I did really like the characters and despite there being quite a few supporting characters, they all began to develop their own characters.

This was such a sweet, feel-good read!

I love the idea of two people who have never met falling for each other, and Jack and Sophia's romance was just the sweetest. If you're a major romance lover like I am, this might be a little tame for you. While the book as a whole read pretty quickly, the romance was pretty slow and a more minor part of the plot than I was expecting. They don't even meet in person until the epilogue. Even so, I really liked them both individually as as a couple and enjoyed reading about how their relationship developed.

I would argue this is primarily contemporary fiction rather than romance, as a large part of the novel is focused on the sense of community during the pandemic and there are a lot of side characters who's own stories are tied into the plot. Although it wasn't what I was expecting, I really enjoyed the community element; the author was able to represent the spirit of the first lockdown pretty well and I loved a lot of the side characters.

The only issue I had was with the epilogue. It is written in third person, which is fine, but felt very detached after the first person narrative of the rest of the book. The whole book had been building to the moment where Jack and Sophia met and I was a little disappointed that we didn't get to experience their thoughts and feelings as they finally saw each other.

Overall although the romance factor was a little lighter than I typically like, I found myself really enjoying so many aspects of this book and would recommend this to others who feel comfortable reading about the pandemic (I know its probably still to close to home for some!).

I was provided a copy of this book on NetGalley for review (thank you!). All opinions are my own!

I didn’t love this book but I also didn’t hate it. Parts were really good and others I felt were a bit rushed! There were some bittersweet moments and some nice side elements to the main story that I really enjoyed.

I was very excited to read this as it sounded like a great premise of falling in love during lockdown, unfortunately it just didn’t quite hit the mark!

It started off really well and it was nice to see how all these characters were coping with the lockdown situation. As Jack and Sophia meet on the balcony (well just their voices as they can’t see each) they become friends which grows into something more. This however is where I feel the book lost it for me. Sophia gets Jack’s phone number so she can add him to a whatsapp group and contact him for shopping lists…so why did they never video call? At one part she also asks him to help her decide on a dress for the wedding and she goes on to describe what she’s wearing because he can’t see her….again why didn’t she just take photos and whatsapp him? I just felt like these were major plot holes. I understand the author wanted to create a love story where they fall in love by not meeting (similar to The FlatShare) but with the amount of technology that was included it just didn’t seem believeable.

I also got fed up with the constant reminders that they were in lockdown or needed to social distance. I gathered this and didn’t need to be told every time characters interacted.

If you overlook these things then it is quite a nice light love story, but there wasn’t enough to keep my attention. I just didn’t click with the characters at all and there was no urgency to the story.

Thanks Netgalley and the publisher for the early copy in exchange for an honest review.

This is my first lockdown book and I was curious how they’d portray it. Sophia and Jack both live in England (maybe London?) and live in the same apartment building. Sophia is a teacher continuing to teach in person and Jack is home. Sophia and Jack start talking one day when they are on their balconies (Jack is above her) and they start chatting and passing things back and forth. They don’t see each other. ⁣
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While this book covers the lockdown it doesn’t talk about people being really sick with covid and doesn’t go into politics. Despite the subject this was a cute read and I could relate to the people at the start of covid who couldn’t figure out Zoom or other technology. There were quite a few parts where I was laughing out loud. ⁣
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The apartment building they are in interacts on their balconies and there’s a few side stories with different people. Although some parts dragged a little for me, this was overall a good read for me!

This book started off quite cute, a couple meet on their balconies during lockdown whilst clapping for the NHS. He hears Sophia from his apartment above and calls down to check that she is ok and we see the start of their friendship.

Due to health reason Jack is isolating in his apartment, Sophia a teacher is still at work so offers to help his out with shopping and anything he may need. They devise a rope and pull system to exchange things, from balcony to balcony which I thought was a lovely idea, including special cocktails are Jack tends bar when he is at work.

I like the concept of the book, but the romance just didn't work for me, I never felt a genuine connection between the two. I did however like how the author highlighted other issues we have all experience in this strange year. People mental health issues, the venerable and elder feeling isolated not to mention the key workers who have continued to work through the pandemic, she managed to cover all angles.

Thanks to Avon Books UK, the author Chloe James and Netgalley for my copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.