Review: 'Mexican Kimono' by Billie Jones (2014)

Mexican Kimono is fast-paced, satirical chick lit by upcoming Australian author, Billie Jones, guaranteed for a laugh or three. Narcissistic Samantha simply can’t resist buying the beautiful kimono at auction on a whim. That’s what credit cards are for, right? And then the kimono’s curse starts taking apart her life, spectacularly and destructively, one hair extension at a time, and Sam’s in for a hell of a ride.
At the start of this year, I was contacted by publisher Really Blue Books about the release of ‘Mexican Kimono’, a new novel by Billie Jones (pseudonym of author Rebecca Raisin, chosen so she could easily separate the different styles of her novels). I hadn’t read anything by Rebecca Raisin before, even though I heard about her and loved the cover of her 2013 Christmas e-book ‘Christmas at the Gingerbread Cafe’. I thought the blurb of ‘Mexican Kimono’ sounded fun and I do enjoy a satirical read every now and again, so a few weeks ago I sat down one afternoon, eager to find out what this novel would be like!
Samantha simply can’t help herself when she spots a gorgeous colourful kimono at an auction she’s attending. Without thinking about it, she pops out her credit card and she’s the new owner of the kimono for the price of 10,000 dollars. However, Samantha’s joy of owning this beautiful garment quickly disappears when she finds out it is actually cursed and completely destroying her life, bit by bit. Samantha finds herself in numerous crazy and inexplicable situations, one after the other, and she knows she has to find a way to break the curse, whatever it takes.
Samantha, the main character in this novel, is nothing like most other chick lit heroines. She is extremely selfish and has a foolish but fascinating way of thinking; she, for example, truly believes that every single guy she meets has a crush on her (which results in some quite funny situations, I have to admit). Most of the time I just wanted to slap her in the face, but at the same time I couldn’t help but laugh at how she sees the world and handles the crazy situations she finds herself in after she has bought the cursed kimono. I guess she is the perfect example of a character you can hate and love at the same time. I loved seeing how the secondary characters in the novel deal with Samantha, and it definitely resulted in some truly entertaining conversations. 
Billie Jones’ writing is quite addictive and made it easy to visualise everything, from the setting to the characters. The story also included quite a few twists and turns I did not see coming; I honestly couldn’t predict what was going to happen in this book, which is also one of the reasons why I just wanted to keep on reading. I suppose I was constantly looking for the basic chick lit recipe, but while the novel definitely has some chick lit elements, it is also quite original in its own way. ‘Mexican Kimono’ is a unique, fast-paced and entertaining novel that is filled with so much satire you can’t help but laugh out loud while reading about Samantha’s life. A fun read and different from anything else I’ve read!
Rating:

   7,5/10
For more information about this book: Amazon UK / Amazon US / Goodreads    Thanks to the publisher for providing me with a review copy in exchange for an honest review.