Summer Nights at the Moonlight Hotel

When Lauren and her friends sign up for salsa lessons, it isn't to meet men - Lauren is totally (though unrequitedly) in love with her work colleague, Edwin and Cate and Emily are happily single (although romance isn't completely off the cards for them should the opportunity arise). 

The salsa classes will be taking place in the ballroom of the Moonlight Hotel, a building that holds many cherished memories for Lauren. So she's devastated when she learns that the hotel has been sold to a chain that will no doubt rip out the Moonlight's soul.

Over the coming weeks, as Lauren and her friends learn to dance, they're faced with events and decisions that could change the path they've chosen in life - and possibly crack the foundations of their friendship.

Having read some of Jane Costello's previous novels, I was looking forward to reading Summer Nights at the Moonlight Hotel. Jane writes with such warmth and humour, creating characters that are endearingly real. I warmed to Lauren immediately and couldn't help giggling at some of the situations she gets herself into. I have to admit that I found her fascination with Edwin a little odd but I was looking forward to seeing how it would all work out.

There are a great cast of characters within the book, from Lauren's best friends, Cate and Emily who are dealing with their own set of problems, to the new friends she meets at the salsa class. The classes sound like a lot of fun and I loved reading about them each week. Lauren is a teacher at a primary school and I also loved the scenes with the children as they brought a lot of humour to the book with the children's observations and comments.

It becomes a little clearer how the book is going to turn out as the story moves along, but I wasn't sure how some of the obstacles were going to be resolved to provide any kind of a happy ever after (a must for a romantic comedy, in my opinion) but I was happy with the outcome. In fact, I was happy with all of the book as it's such a fun read. There are some not-so-fun aspects to the book but I think these were dealt with sensitively.

I really enjoyed Summer Nights at the Moonlight Hotel and look forward to reading more from Jane Costello in the future.