Tag: romance

‘A Wedding in the Country’ by Katie Fforde

A new novel from Katie Fforde is always a treat – so much so that I don’t even need to read the blurb to know that I’ll like it!

Precisely because I hadn’t read the blurb, I was surprised that this book takes place in 1963 as I am used to Fforde’s contemporary romances. What a great setting! From early 1960s London – just about starting to swing – to the promised wedding in the country…this has interesting and engaging settings throughout.

The book is about a young woman, Lizzie, who moves to London to attend a cookery school. Once the course is finished, she cannot bear to think about giving up her new-found freedoms by returning home and so moves into a shabby but fabulous shared house in Belgravia with her new (clearly very wealthy) friends. This leads on to invitations to the country to stay in stately homes…and – before she knows it – her life has been turned upside down and will never be the same again.

Wow, it is hard to write about this book without giving spoilers!

I read Katie Fforde books precisely because nothing bad will happen and everything will work out fine – it is comforting and uplifting, even if it means slightly suspending disbelief at times that things can work out so fortunately. Lucky for Lizzie that one of her cookery course-mates has a huge house in Belgravia – just the first of many fortuitous events!

The characters are appealing and relatable – Lizzie is our fish-out-of-water in the setting of her wealthy friends, David is the gay character whose sexuality is closing doors to him in 1960s London, Meg is a hard-working and talented cook and Alexandra is wealthy but generous in sharing her shabby house with them all. The supporting characters are also generally nice, or at least see the error of their narrow thinking by the end of the novel – this was the 1960s, after all, so we can’t expect modern attitudes to various issues, something that sustains the main plot lines of the book,

The book is a romance and ticks all the boxes that you’d expect – misunderstandings, obstacles and delays abound. However, the love story actually takes a bit of a back seat as Fforde instead focuses on the themes of friendship, social attitudes and even class systems, although – as you’d expect from Fforde – always with a light touch and never preachy.

My only criticism is that the book was a little slow in places and it takes a very long time before the wedding in the country (promised in the title) appears on the horizon. This seems a bit like a spoiler or – at very least – a mis-titling of the book as it is about so much more than a wedding.

Overall, I’d recommend this to fans of Fforde’s contemporary fiction and anyone who needs a reassuring, comfort blanket of a read. It is definitely one to pick up for escapism – maybe something we all need right now.

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for my copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

If you’d like a copy of this book, please use my affiliate link below – thank you for supporting my blog with any purchases.

Header photo with thanks to Jeremy Wong Weddings on Unsplash.

Blog Tour: ‘Behind Closed Doors’ by Catherine Alliott

Welcome to my stop on the blog tour for ‘Behind Closed Doors’ by Catherine Alliott.

This book was published on 4th March by Michael Joseph and I thank the publisher for my copy of the book in exchange for an honest review, plus the invitation to join the tour.

I’ve read a lot of Catherine Alliott’s books, although not so recently, so I thought I knew what I was getting myself into with this one. Absolutely not so!

In this book, Lucy Palmer seems to have it all – a big house in London, a job writing cosy crime novels, a handsome husband and two grown-up children who are both successful in their own ways. However, this is all a facade and Lucy’s marriage is about to end spectacularly and suddenly – and, when is does, she has some work to do in dealing with her past. Leaving London, she goes to care for her elderly and bordering-on-alcoholic parents in the country where she starts to rebuild her life.

This is an altogether darker story than I am used to from Alliott, both in the truth about Lucy’s husband, Michael, and the events surrounding the end of the marriage. It also touches on some poignant issues, especially caring for elderly parents and ageing.

However, everything else I expected from Alliott is also there, so this slightly darker turn works well. It still has elements of humour – I really loved Lucy’s parents and their hectic social life of boozy octogenarian parties, plus the sassy teenage twins who have much more of a finger on the pulse than the adults. There’s also romantic strands to the story, although these aren’t as central as I would have expected given what I’ve read of Alliott’s writing previously. Instead, the love story is quite understated and works really well given Lucy’s situation.

I really loved the family dynamic that is at the heart of this book. Lucy is at the centre of a supportive, if slightly eccentric, family network and this is one of the real strengths of the novel. There’s the ageing parents, growing old disgracefully but still frail, Lucy’s sister (Helena) who absolutely has control of everything except her own children, plus Lucy’s children – the strong and reliable Imo and thoughtful, calm Ned. I especially liked the strong women in the novel – Helena and Imo being my favourites, although there are other surprisingly awesome women (and a few men!) along the way.

Although this was not what I wholly expected when I picked up this book, I’d recommend it. It is certainly less cosy than I was anticipating and includes some difficult issues, not least domestic abuse, but it is an immersive and engaging read. I genuinely struggled to put it down and loved the clever, understated explorations of relationships and dependencies between people.

‘The Split’ by Laura Kay

Happy publication day to this funny and uplifting book which I was fortunate enough to read towards the end of last year during lockdown.

I’d heard lots about this book on Twitter and felt that a cheery read was needed, so thought I would give it a try. I’m so glad I did – it was just what I needed to lift me out of the November gloom!

The main character, Ally, starts this book at her lowest ebb. She has quit her job and been dumped by her girlfriend, Emily, leaving her effectively homeless as she has to leave Emily’s houseboat. Taking the cat, who becomes a topic of dispute between the two ex-partners, she heads back to Sheffield and her father’s house. Initially wallowing in her own grief, she starts to see light at the end of the tunnel after rekindling an old friendship, using her passion for baking to find a new job and – most unlikely of all – taking up running after she (rather ill-advisedly) signs up for a half marathon.

I thought that Kay did a gorgeous job of exploring Ally’s thought processes as she worked her way through the end of her relationship. It felt real, with all its ups and downs, irrational thoughts and acts of pettiness – the emails between Emily and Ally about the cat were particularly telling. I also loved Ally’s feeling about running – as someone who has tried and failed to run, I really could imagine the scenes as she slogged round various circuits with no joy and considerable pain!

Indeed, the characterisation is the real strength in this novel = Ally’s friend Jeremy (who is nursing his own heartbreak) is funny and sweet and just the kind of person you’d want on your team if you were in Ally’s situation. Ally’s dad is similarly wonderful – a supportive, straight-talking (when needed) and realistic parent who has his own ways of getting Ally back on the road to recovery – I loved the disco for Syria scenes as these were so keenly observed by someone who clearly has experienced (in recent memory and with vivid clarity) the joys of a school dance!

The plot followed a fairly predictable course, but that absolutely was not a problem as I was reading this exactly to avoid any stressful or horrible situations. Instead, I was treated to a comfortable and engaging read as I followed Ally’s journey back to happiness. It’s a novel that has moments of sadness, but also bucketloads of humour and really relatable moments.

I’d recommend this to anyone who enjoys uplifting stories which are strong on character – those in a similar vein to Beth O’Leary’s ‘The Flatshare’ and ‘The Switch’. I enjoyed this a lot and it made a cheerless lockdown day a lot brighter.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for my advance copy in exchange for an honest review.

If you’d like a copy of this book, my affiliate link is below. Thanks for supporting my blog with any purchases.

Header photo by Allec Gomes on Unsplash.

Blog Tour: ‘Bad Habits’ by Flynn Meaney

Welcome to my stop on the blog tour for ‘Bad Habits’ by Flynn Meaney, a very funny YA novel with a school setting and a feminist heart!

Everybody needs to read a funny book from time to time, and this one proved the right book at the right time for me. I’m perhaps not the target audience, being several decades older than the main characters, but it certainly made me laugh. Thanks to NetGalley, the publisher (Penguin) and The Write Reads for my copy in exchange for an honest review.

The story is set in St Mary’s Catholic School, a strict boarding school in America, where the main character, Alex, is determined to have an impact. In fact, what she’d really like is to be expelled. Her purple hair and incessant rule-breaking isn’t proving enough, so she decides that she will stage the school’s first production of ‘The Vagina Monologues’ with her (mostly less-than-keen) feminist club.

This book is the story of the battle to bring the play to the stage – a battle that Alex takes on to both shock and prove her feminist credentials. What she finds is that the challenges aren’t the ones she expects.

Alex as a main character is spiky, sassy and cool – everything I wasn’t at school, so I found her pretty interesting! I’m not sure she is really intended to be likeable at the start of the book – her instinct is to push back on everything and everyone in order to prove her rebel status. However, as the book progresses, I did warm to her and felt that she started to see the bigger picture.

However, more immediately likeable is Alex’s roommate, Mary Kate. She is more relatable for me and a whole lot less prickly – although she does have determination and is a strong character in her own right. The other supporting characters are also appealing, particularly the very tolerant Pat and the rather diverse bunch in the feminist club.

I’ve always been a sucker for a school story, even from my youngest years reading Enid Blyton’s Mallory Towers books, and I enjoyed this one. I like the boarding school setting with the range of teachers (the usual suspects – scary, eccentric, kindly) and the rivalries of the cliques. The fact it is a co-ed American boarding school, whose team sport is ice hockey, seems to me to have a glamour and interest not found in the school stories of tuck boxes, lights-out and cross-country races that I grew up with!

This is more than a school story though – it is a funny school story! There were several points that made me laugh out loud and I loved the absurdity of some of the situations – I don’t want to give any spoilers so I’ll just say the recruitment drive the sleeping nun and the protest all made me smile. Alex’s voice is a humorous one and she calls on a range of unusual references, from Harry Potter to metaphysical poet Andrew Marvell, which I loved – it made her narration engaging, often surprising and clever.

There are serious messages in the book, particularly around feminism and gender. I won’t give anything away, but I will say that I thought the ethos of the book was positive and I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend it to teenagers – although there are a lot of sex references and some swearing (which I – not a regular reader of YA fiction – was quite surprised by).

Overall, I’d recommend this book to anyone who likes funny books, school stories or just likes fiction with a solid feminist message. Personally, I love all three of those things, so it is a big thumbs-up from me!

If you’d like your own copy of this book, my affiliate link is below – thanks for supporting my blog with any purchases.

‘Just Like You’ by Nick Hornby

Released this week – a new book from Nick Hornby is always an event in my diary!

I feel like I should declare my love of Nick Hornby books at the start of this review – I usually love the dialogue and the insight into people and the humour of Hornby’s writing. Indeed, ‘High Fidelity’ is up there with my absolute favourite novels and I think I’ve read pretty much all his work.

This book had so much promise – essentially an age gap romance between a 42 year-old white woman (Lucy) and a 22 year-old black man (Joseph) set against the Brexit referendum. There’s loads of scope for exploration of people’s attitudes to race, class, age, 21st century British society…so far, so good!

And indeed, a lot of this is delivered upon very well by Hornby – he perfectly captures, for example, the rage caused by Brexit on both sides of the Leave/Remain debate. Lucy’s job as a teacher also struck a chord with me as reflecting my own life.

However, it’s not a perfect novel. While it’s enjoyable and interesting, it doesn’t quite hit the spot for a romance as it’s too messy and makes you wonder what the appeal is in the relationship, especially for Lucy who tolerates some pretty poor behaviour from Joseph. It felt a bit more like social commentary than a fully absorbing novel in places.

Overall, I would say this is an engaging and light read with some interesting points about British culture in the age of Brexit and Black Lives Matter. Whether it works as a romance is more up for debate – it didn’t for me. If you like Hornby’s writing (as I do) then you’ll probably like this, but for everyone else then I’d start with ‘High Fidelity’ or ‘About a Boy’ as Hornby’s real masterpieces.

I received a free copy of the novel from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

You can buy this book using the link below – I may earn commission on purchases at no extra cost to you.

Header photo with thanks to Jude Beck for sharing their work on Unsplash.

‘The Flat Share’ by Beth O’Leary

This is another book that’s on the shortlist for the Comedy Women in Print 2020 prize. Beth O’Leary’s second novel, ‘The Switch’ is another gem if you liked this one!

Tiffy has broken up with her horrible boyfriend, Justin, and needs somewhere to stay. Her job publishing rather niche crochet books pays a pittance, so she is tempted with an interesting flat-share proposition; for cheap rent, she can inhabit Leon’s flat during the nights and weekends while he is at work at the hospice and staying with his girlfriend, Kay.

So Tiffy and Leon share a bed, but never at the same time. It seems like an ideal solution, but things change and life gets in the way of the best laid plans.

I really enjoyed this. Yes, it’s a bit predictable and there are some amazing coincidences that the plot relies on heavily. However, it’s a cheerful and lively read that will keep you turning the pages as Tiffy and Leon get to know each other without meeting – the trails of notes are really sweet.

There are also lots of likeable characters and some real pantomime villains. It does occasionally get a bit dark in places, but there are some lovely humorous touches too; I especially liked Katherin, the crochet queen, and Rachel, the oversharing work friend.

Overall, there is a lot to enjoy here and it was great to read something light and happy. I’d recommend this and will look for more from this writer in the future.

I received a free copy of the novel from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Header photo with thanks to Scott Webb for sharing their work on Unsplash.