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Number-one best-selling author Sophie Kinsella's emotionally charged new stand-alone novel about marriage and family and how those we love and know best can sometimes surprise us the most.

After being together for 10 years, Sylvie and Dan have all the trimmings of a happy life and marriage; they have a comfortable home, fulfilling jobs, and beautiful twin girls and communicate so seamlessly, they finish each other's sentences. However, a trip to the doctor projects they will live another 68 years together, and panic sets in. They never expected "until death do us part" to mean seven decades.

In the name of marriage survival, they quickly concoct a plan to keep their relationship fresh and exciting: They will create little surprises for each other so that their (extended) years together will never become boring. But in their pursuit to execute Project Surprise Me, mishaps arise, and secrets are uncovered that start to threaten the very foundation of their unshakable bond. When a scandal from the past is revealed that questions some important untold truths, they begin to wonder if they ever really knew each other after all.

With a colorful, eccentric cast of characters, razor-sharp observations, and her signature wit and charm, Sophie Kinsella crafts a humorous yet thoughtful portrait of a marriage and shines a light on the danger of not looking past the many layers of the ones you love to discover how infinitely fascinating - and surprising - they truly are.

Reviewer: Savvyreader
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Excellent Story!
Review: Nothing here is what it seems at first. But these fiercely determined characters make it all come out great, even better than it looked in the beginning. What a glorious ride of a book!

Reviewer: 1Barkeep
Rating: 4.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Cute but offers some insight
Review: I've read all of her books and I'm not quite sure why they are so many bad reviews. While it was not as funny to me as, for example, the Shopaholic series, I still found it to be an interesting book that I did not have to spend pages trying to get into and found it easy to maintain interest until the end. While not as funny, I found her writing in this novel to be a little more profound and down to earth, well, as much as a Sophie Kinsella book is able to be at this point. It's certainly different than many of her past works and I'm OK with watching her evolve as a writer. Well,as long as she throws out one of her hilarious books now and then.I felt that you can gain some insights into the amount of respect and understanding that you have to continually strive for in order to sustain a long term marriage. At over 30 years into it myself, it seemed to me that she was able to show Sylvie and Dan learning to grow and adapt to the constantly changing requirements and needs of both your marriage as well as your partner. It seemed to me that her lighthearted attempt to showcase this kept the novel interesting yet not too preachy as another author may have done.So while it is a humorous attempt, it still does make some valid points to take away with you after the last page.

Reviewer: Danielle
Rating: 3.0 out of 5 stars
Title: heartfelt but unimpressive
Review: I would like to thank Sophie Kinsella, The Dial Press/Penguin Random House, and NetGalley for allowing me to read an ARC in exchange for an honest review.After speaking with their doctor, Sylvie and Dan Winter are daunted by the prospect of sixty-eight more years of marriage. Realizing they know each other too well, Sylvie starts Project Surprise Me in an effort to keep them interested in one another. Most of their surprises go awry, though, and lead to unintentional surprises—like long-kept secrets with the power to shatter the bubble of ignorance in which they’ve been functioning. What starts as an effort to save their marriage…might actually destroy it._____SpoilersThis book wasn’t a disaster, I enjoyed it, but it wasn’t Kinsella’s best work.There were two plots. The first, which I’ll call Project Surprise Me, had a light tone and themes of living in the moment and loving completely. It was instigated and propped up by an absurdly thoughtless and unprofessional claim made by their doctor. I think Sylvie and Dan took it way too seriously and lent it more credence than it deserved. It was a flimsy foundation for a plot that fizzled out in the end. The second plot, which I’ll dub Protect Sylvie, was darker and dealt with pride, disillusionment, and the depths of grief. The two were incorporated well but not seamlessly. Project Surprise Me eventually got lost in Protect Sylvie.I could predict the direction the story was going in, but I couldn’t predict the details. The pace was a touch slow in the middle, and I believe some elements were unnecessary and could have been removed—for example, Mary ultimately served no purpose—but then this relatively short book would have been even shorter, and short books aren’t as lucrative.The characters were okay, but I didn’t fall in love with any of them. I sympathized with Sylvie somewhat, but I think that was more a product of the first-person narrative than any emotional connection I had with her. Other than blonde hair, we didn’t have much in common, so it was difficult to relate. Also, Sylvie’s fear of heights was one of the unnecessary elements. I very much did not appreciate the demonstration of her courage at the end, because it killed the momentum of their reunion, which was more important than her irrelevant fear of heights.Dan was nice, but his personal goals and motivations, other than to protect Sylvie from the truth because he thought it would break her, were enigmatic, and I didn’t fully understand him as a character. I still have questions. Was his work situation resolved? He was going to do some major expansions, but I’m not sure if he did or not. And I’m not sure why he felt the need to in the first place. To compete with Sylvia’s dad in wealth? He never felt the need before, so why did he suddenly want to compete? I’m not sure what changed.And why, exactly, did he invite his old mates over for a sudden, random dinner party? We’re led to believe it was so he could see Mary again and start an affair with her, but we learn that was unfounded, so why did Kinsella bother to include it? Did Dan think catching up with his past would make him feel less stressed about his present? That’s a bit hypocritical, since he was always telling Sylvie to stop dwelling on the past. I think it was said that he “downloaded” on Mary—or at least he halfway wanted to, but never actually did, since Mary didn’t know jack squat. As a result, her only purpose was to torture Sylvie, and that wasn’t necessary, because Sylvie already suspected something fishy was going on behind her back.I gotta say though, Mary handled the entire situation with eerie aplomb. Imagine a guy you dated over ten years ago suddenly tracked you down and, in the capacity of friendship, wanted to vent his problems to you. Wouldn’t that be at least a little weird? Not for Mary; she acted like it was totally inconsequential.As for the other characters, Mummy was a psycho who thrived on denial. Mrs. Kendrick was a willfully ignorant woman whose tastes included everything old-fashioned and antifeminist. However, she was willing, even determined, to learn and modernize, which endeared me to her. The twins were just there, and Prof. Russell and Owen were unnecessary (though I liked them a lot). I liked Tilda, but Toby was useless. And lastly, I was pleasantly surprised when Robert’s attitude changed for the better.But despite its flaws, Surprise Me is filled with heart and good intention. It contains a great message about marriage, love, and realistic expectations. Mechanically, the writing was skilled, and stylistically, it was classic Kinsella, with charming awkwardness and amusing inner dialogue tangents and fabrication. I eagerly await Kinsella’s next book.noapologybookreviews.com

Reviewer: victoria
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: fun reading.
Review: I loved all the characters and the situations they got in and how they approached them. It was humorous even during the serious times.

Reviewer: Laura Simmons
Rating: 4.0 out of 5 stars
Title: I really enjoyed Surprise Me
Review: I really enjoyed Surprise Me. I've enjoyed every book Sophie Kinsella has written, and this was no exception. The reason I took one star off was that I wish more time was spent at Willoughby House, with Clarissa, Robert and Mrs. Kendrick. I also thought the surprises that backfired were hilarious, particularly the boudoir photos. But it got really serious abruptly after that. And I notice that Kinsellla has a type of formula for most of her books, in which the female protagonist gets heartbroken because of a major misunderstanding, and doesn't see the light till it's almost too late. This is certainly true with Sylvie. And the ending always resolves itself so well that it would be unrealistic in real life. Despite these flaws, I recommend this book for any Kinsella fan.

Reviewer: Fiona Ferris
Rating: 3.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Hard to get excited about
Review: I don't like to give bad book reviews, and Surprise Me wasn't bad... but it wasn't great. I had to really force myself to keep on reading because it just didn't hold my interest. I almost felt like Sophie Kinsella has regressed with her writing skill, or perhaps she had to force herself to keep on writing and her heart wasn't really in it. I even put it down and read another book in the middle of Surprise Me, which is unheard of for me with a Sophie Kinsella title.My main issue with this book is that it seemed like a lot of different bits glued together. It was disjointed. It dragged in parts. Certain points were given loads of coverage then disappeared so that I forgot about them, only to think later on 'Was that from another book, oh, it was from this book'. Then that long-forgotten part of the story would come back with full force. The premise was thin and drawn out and the main characters seemed immature.I persevered though, a) because I have enjoyed most of Sophie's others books, and b) because I'd paid for it. There's nothing like feeling like you have wasted your money to want to continue. And I am happy to say that the end of the book was satisfying. I'd still give it three stars even with the good ending and would only recommend you read it if you are a die-hard Sophie Kinsella fan.

Reviewer: Amazone
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: Tutto perfetto, ottimo prodotto, grazie.

Reviewer: ENW
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: Drôle, comme toujours avec Sophie Kinsella, des personnages attachants, on souffre et on rit avec le personnage principal et on a envie de savoir comment elle va s'en sortir.

Reviewer: MAGUTOGO
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: Si te gusta la literatura de Sophie kinsella es otra de sus novelas un poco más adulta, la protagonista pasa por problemas más propios de una mujer adulta y casada, este es el primer libro donde ya está con una pareja. Eso lo hace diferente.

Reviewer: Afelsky
Rating: 4.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: It is a good read but not the best of this author.

Reviewer: Bruno
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: Good fun book! Relaxing to read