How to Keep A Husband for 10 Days

Title: How to Keep a Husband for 10 Days 
Author: Jessica Hatch
Format: E-Book 
Rating: 3 Stars 

Publication Date: February 8, 2023

Publisher: Bookouture

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Pretending to be married to the man you were married to… How hard can it be?!

When Lina’s oldest friends unexpectedly announce they’re coming to stay, she has to think fast. No one knows she and her husband Brown are breaking up, and so she persuades him to act as if they aren’t… After all, how hard can it be to pretend to be married for ten days?

Turns out, a lot harder than she thought. On day one, she strikes so many couple poses that she throws her back out. On day two, she gets muscle spasms from smiling too hard at her husband’s jokes. On day three, she almost has a heart attack when she puts her hand far too high up his thigh at the dinner table. And on day four, when she accidentally grazes Brown’s lips when aiming for his cheek, she almost passes out in the middle of the restaurant.

By day five, Lina is starting to realise there’s a thin line between love and hate. And while she can try to fool her friends, she can’t fool her heart. Was she too hasty calling time on her marriage? Is this more than make believe? And does she even have enough time to find out if Brown feels the same?

This absolutely hilarious and totally addictive romcom is perfect for fans of Ali Hazelwood’s The Love Hypothesis, Christina Lauren’s The Unhoneymooners, and Emily Henry.

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How to Keep a Husband For 10 Days is a forthcoming book by author Jessica Hatch.  This book has an interesting premise for a rom-com because the couple is already married.  The book goes back and forth between their time when they were first married and living in this little apartment in a small building, and the time in the present when they are going through a divorce.

Here's a little background: Lina and Brown are getting divorced.  Their friend Freddy still owns the building they all met in and held progressive dinner parties in for years. Freddy's building is about to be sold to someone trying to "snazz up" the neighborhood - read: Gentrification.  Freddy is trying to do everything they can to keep the property as is because they really want to be able to provide affordable housing in a city that doesn't have a lot of those options. 

There really wasn't a ton of "Comedy" in this self proclaimed rom-com.  It did have a few WTF moments, but nothing that I'd say really put it solidly in that rom-com category.  Also, the fact that the couple was already married made for an interesting premise because we already know they were in love once, and probably still are (it is labeled as a romance, after all.) The way they come to different realizations throughout the book is the way you'd expect any married couple to.  They have a lot of fun at the beginning, but things get hard once they're on their own away from their friends.  Then they realize that marriage is not always easy - that sort of stuff happens with married couples.  They both realized this, but what they never did realize was that they don't really have that much in common with each other - which leads me to wonder why they got married in the first place. 

Lina did learn a few things throughout the book about what she would need to do in order to be a good wife and about how to admit things about herself that she needed to work on.  And I wish Brown had done the same, but he seemed to stay pretty stagnant throughout the book.  There was little surprise that their friend Sarah became even more self centered in the "current" part of the book than in the "past."  Freddy and Mia, to me, seemed to be the most balanced, open, and developed characters in the book. They could have made a whole book just about those two and the passion they had and the way they cared so much for people besides themselves. 

Overall, I didn't hate this book, but I definitely could have done with some more actual rom-com and better developed characters. 

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Disclaimer: I received a copy of this book as an ARC from the publisher through Netgalley.  This has not influenced my review in any way.