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Archive for April, 2009

Author of the Week: Milly Johnson

Posted on Thursday, April 30th, 2009 by Chloe

millyauthoroftheweek Every so often, a new author comes along that receives superb reviews for their debut novel, and they just get better and better.

Milly Johnson’s debut novel “The Yorkshire Pudding Club” was a huge hit, and her follow up books “The Birds and the Bees” and her latest release “A Spring Affair” have also been brilliant, and have been favourites with her fans.

Here’s a short bio from one of her websites, http://www.thenewromantics.org:

“Milly Johnson was born in Barnsley, raised in Barnsley and still lives in Barnsley - although she did study in Exeter for four years and emigrate to Haworth in West Yorkshire in the 1980s.

She trained as an actress, teacher, an accountant, a Customer Services and Suggestion Scheme Manager as well as working in a variety of administrative posts for companies dealing with anything from antique furniture to plastic injection moulded poop scoops. Eventually she found a happy existence writing poems and jokes for the greetings card world - helping to kick off the hugely successful Purple Ronnie project - which she still does on a part time basis whilst penning her novels.”

(more…)

Posted in Author of the Week | No Comments »

Book News: May 2009 Releases Part 2

Posted on Thursday, April 30th, 2009 by Leah

pollywilliamsworldsworstwife POLLY WILLIAMS - THE WORLDS WORST WIFE - 14TH MAY
Don’t try this at home …Sadie Drew thinks she may actually be the world’s worst wife. She only needs to walk into a room to make it untidy.

There are always leeks liquefying in her fridge. And her three-year-old son is now the love of her life. Husband doesn’t seem to mind so much, until he gets a big high-pressure job and things change.

She suspects he’s cheating.

The marriage starts to fall apart and, as mother-in-law smugly points out, Sadie faces a stark choice: risk losing everything or up her game. Can she transform herself into the perfect wife?

And ultimately is this a game worth winning? weddingbabylonimogenedwardsjones

IMOGEN EDWARDS-JONES - WEDDING BABYLON - 21ST MAY
It is a truth universally acknowledged that everyone loves a good wedding. Except, possibly, the bride and groom, who spend the day in such an overexcited frenzy that they can’t remember it. And the bridesmaids, who are forced to wear ill-fitting peach taffeta so as not to outshine the bride. And the best man, who has to make a terrifying speech in front of a room of drunken people he’s never met before, then fight off the attentions of the chief bridesmaid. Oh, and the father of the bride, who has to pay through the nose for the whole thing…Now, in the bestselling Babylon tradition, Imogen Edwards-Jones lifts the lid on the excesses of the wedding industry.This title presents the scams which inflate the prices of everything from flowers to cakes to marquee hire. And the wedding disaster stories of high jinks at the altar and disastrous low comedy in the speeches. The potential for things to go horribly, horribly wrong is never higher than at a wedding. Hilarious, shocking and thoroughly entertaining, “Wedding Babylon” is proof positive that the dream day is never far from becoming a nightmare. fionaneillfriendsloverdiscretions

FIONA NEILL - FRIENDS, LOVERS & OTHER INDISCRETIONS - 21ST MAY
It’s early 2008 and the credit crunch is starting to bite. Sam and Laura Diamond - and their friends - are circling forty and all feeling a lot less certain about life than when they first met in their twenties. Laura wants to work part-time and have a third child - an appalling prospect for her husband Sam, whose secret ambition is to give up his job as a struggling scriptwriter and have a vasectomy. Life’s no more straightforward for wild child turned corporate lawyer Janey Dart. Having finally given up on Patrick, the love of her life, she finds herself unexpectedly pregnant and hastily married to a wealthy hedge fund manager who loathes her friends. And Sam’s oldest friend, trendy restaurant owner Jonathan Sleet, is about to hit the big time with a TV series and cookbook, but can’t control his roving eye. So it’s no surprise that back on their organic farm in Suffolk, his once glamorous wife Hannah is finding distractions of her own. Determined to reunite the group, Jonathan brings everyone together for a holiday to celebrate his fortieth birthday. But six friends, two decades of tangled fortunes and an explosive secret from the past make for an unforgettable week. tillybagshaweflawless

TILLY BAGSHAWE - FLAWLESS - 28TH MAY
In the glitteringly ruthless diamond business, Scarlett Drummond Murray is a force to be reckoned with. As stunningly beautiful as the diamonds she works with, Scarlett is determined to make her mark on the industry with her fabulous jewellery creations. But to do so she must battle through a world that is steeped in greed and corruption.

Blazing a trail from London to Beverly Hills, Scarlett is plunged into the world of shady diamond dealers and the stunningly beautiful women for whom they all compete, in business and in bed. All of them are prepared to sacrifice everything in pursuit of that one, elusive, perfect stone. No matter what the cost. Will Scarlett be blinded by the brilliance of the temptation that surrounds her?

Or can she keep her nerve - and her principles - and make it to the top with her heart and her business intact? lolajayewhileyouweredreaming1

LOLA JAYE - WHILE YOU WERE DREAMING - 28TH MAY
Lena has always kept her two sisters Millie and Cara in check. Beautiful but lazy Millie relies on her sister for everything. She needs to pull herself together and get a job but is constantly distracted by the string of men in her life! Cara runs a successful bar with her adoring boyfriend Ade.He can’t wait to start a family but Cara isn’t ready. Will she ever be? But when Lena is involved in an accident her sisters forget their own issues and rush to her side.As they desperately try to wake Lena from her deep sleep, they begin to learn things they never knew about themselves and discover their much-loved sister had a few secrets in her closet! A funny and heartwarming tale about family, love and living for the moment.

Posted in 2009 Releases, Book News | No Comments »

Book News: May 2009 Releases Part 1

Posted on Thursday, April 30th, 2009 by Leah

colettecaddlebetweenthesheets2 COLETTE CADDLE - BETWEEN THE SHEETS - 5TH MAY
Dana De Lacey, bestselling romance novelist, has the world at her feet. The words on the page flow easily; an exciting new book deal beckons, and life at home in Dublin is good. But Dana’s self-confidence and success depend on one person: her gorgeous husband, Gus. Without him, she has no fall-back. No children, no close family of her own to call upon. When Gus leaves her, she is devastated. The words fail to come. The alcohol flows too freely. She cannot sleep. Then her estranged brother, Ed, arrives to take care of her out of the blue, and memories which she has buried for many years begin to surface: startling recollections of a childhood and a little girl long-forgotten, which inspire Dana at last to write from the heart. Which Dana was it that Gus walked out on — the glamorous party girl, whose romantic novels always have a happy ending? Or someone with a different name, whose life tells a very different story? Forced to face up to the past, can she find the real Dana, recover her career, and try to make Gus love her for the person she really is? zoebarnesreturntosender

ZOE BARNES - RETURN TO SENDER - 7TH MAY
The double christening of her sisters’ two kids gets Holly Bennett thinking. She would seriously love to have a baby one day, but for the first time in ages being adopted has become a stumbling block for her.

Does she want to start a family of her own when she doesn’t even know who she really is or where she’s come from? With an on-off boyfriend who she’s swiftly falling out of lust with, Holly decides to move back to her home town to be near her adoptive family. Who knows, it may be the change she needs to get her life back on track - and the place to be if she wants to begin tracing her roots. But these roots prove trickier to trace than Holly has expected.

That is, until she hires her own oh-so-sexy private investigator to take charge… rebeccafarnworthvalentine

REBECCA FARNWORTH - VALENTINE - 7TH MAY
Will a shocking secret cause a rising star to fall? Valentine Fleming has always dreamed of being an actress but after years of failed auditions and broken dreams, her hopes are fading fast - so too is her self-esteem - and her only chance of landing a starring role is leading a theatre group for a group of disinterested, Lynx-drenched, hormonal teenagers. So when she gets a call from her agent telling her she has a part in a play with a sexy leading man, she’s over the moon. She’s not packing her bags for the Hollywood hills just yet but could this be the lucky break she has been looking for? But just as it seems that her luck might be set to change and Valentine starts to imagine her name in lights once more, she learns a shocking truth that someone very close to her has kept from her for too long, and the life Valentine once knew no longer seems her own. The new man in her life challenges her feelings for someone in her past and gives her a taste of the heady high life of star-studded, red carpet premieres but amongst it all, she struggles to find love with Mr Right and discovers too that old habits die hard.

KATE MORRIS - THE SEVEN YEAR ITCH - 7TH MAY katemorrissevenyearitch

Meet Ellie. She’s been married to Jack for seven years, has two occasionally-adorable-but-mostly-demanding children and is about to open a café with her friend, Tilda. But Jack is a soap actor whose long-running character has been killed off, leaving him hanging around the house and getting under the feet of Petra, an au pair too glamorous for her own good – even if she is a dab hand with glitter and glue. Meanwhile Ellie’s excitement about the café is making her marriage seem dreary in comparison and when the gorgeous Mark moves in next door (with a wife in tow, admittedly) she asks herself when she and Jack went past their sell-by-date. How can she put the sizzle back into her love life without breaking the rules? And is there really something better out there – or is she just scratching a classic seven year itch? letterstoaloverat-niamhgreene

NIAMH GREENE - LETTERS TO A LOVE RAT - 7 MAY
What do you do when the love of your life turns out to be a good-for-nothing love rat? a) Pour your heart out to him in private letters that he’ll never see. (Secretly you think it’s a big fat waste of time but your therapist says it’s the prefect way to express your inner rage and who are you to argue with science?) b) Pretend it’s not happening and carry on? (The pressure to act normally will almost kill you of course – but it would be much worse if anyone ever suspected that your life was less than perfect.) c) Create a blog and tell the whole world about your problems? (You need advice and, if he won’t listen to you, there are plenty of people out there who will. What harm can it do? Especially if you keep your identity top-secret.) Three very different women have one thing in common – a good-for-nothing Casanova called Charlie. When he betrays them, they choose three very different ways to cope. But can they ever get over him? And will the love rat ever learn his lesson?

Posted in 2009 Releases, Book News | No Comments »

Book Review: The Reading Group by Elizabeth Noble

Posted on Wednesday, April 29th, 2009 by Leah

elizabethnoblereadinggroup The Reading Group follows the trials and tribulations of a group of women who meet regularly to read and discuss books.Over the course of a year, each of these women become intertwined, both in the books they read and within each other’s lives.

Inspired by a shared desire for conversation, a good book and a glass of wine-Clare, Harriet, Nicole, Polly, and Susan undergo startling revelations and transformations despite their differences in background, age and respective dilemmas.

What starts as a reading group gradually evolves into a forum where the women may express their views through the books they read and grow to become increasingly more open as the bonds of friendship cement.

In The Reading Group, Noble reveals the many complicated paths in life we all face as well as the power and importance of friendship.

(more…)

Posted in 2003 reviews, Book Reviews, Rating: 2/5 | No Comments »

Book News: May Releases from Little Black Dress

Posted on Wednesday, April 29th, 2009 by Leah

youkillmealisongayilin As I did last month: here are the May releases from Little Black Dress.

ALISON GAYLIN - YOU KILL ME - 30TH APRIL

Samantha Leiffer is back and in trouble again in the spine-tingling follow-up to the brilliant Hide Your Eyes

After Samantha Leiffer witnessed a murder (and was nearly killed herself for doing so), life has never quite been the same. Everyone else seems just to think it’s taking her a while to ‘adjust’ back to everyday reality, but increasingly Sam’s convinced there’s still something strange in the air.

When a mysterious stranger hands her a note on the street warning her of ‘danger’ ahead, she knows the freakiness has gone way too far. And when people around her suddenly start dying, she knows her life is spiralling into darkness once more…

trueloveandotherdisastersrachelgibson RACHEL GIBSON - TRUE LOVE & OTHER DISASTERS - 14TH MAY

Heartache, hockey and heavenly bodies – get ready for another red-hot read from Rachel Gibson

When money-bags Virgil Duffy leaves his widow a stash of cash and his beloved ice-hockey team in his will, team captain Ty ‘Saint’ Savage is furious.

The Chinooks are set to win the biggest prize of the season, and a beautiful young ex-stripper taking over the reins is the last thing he needs.

Even if Faith, former playmate of the year, is the sexiest woman he’s ever laid on. Soon tensions are mounting between the Saint and the Sinner from Vegas – but maybe Ty’s forgotten the first rule of play: never underestimate your opponent…

theonethatgotawayjessicafox JESSICA FOX - THE ONE THAT GOT AWAY (HEN NIGHT PROPHECIES 1) - 28TH MAY

THE ONE THAT GOT AWAY is the first novel in a fantastic new series called THE HEN NIGHT PROPHECIES, following the fortunes of five different girls, each given their own puzzling prophecy at a friend’s hen night…

Zoe Piper adores her four best friends – Fern, Libby, Charlotte and Priya – so is thrilled when they can all make it to her hen night, where one of the girls arranges for a tarot-card reader to give them a reading individually. Afterwards, each one stumbles out a little dazed, perplexed by how spookily accurate the reader was, but each one keeps quiet about their own readings. In each of the five volumes of THE HEN NIGHT PROPHECIES we learn how their prophecies come true – this first book follows the fortunes of Fern, who is told that she has already met The One, but let him go…

COMING TOMORROW: MAY RELEASES FROM ALL OTHER PUBLISHERS…

Posted in 2009 Releases, Book News, Little Black Dress | No Comments »

Book News and Cover: The Secret Shopper Unwrapped by Kate Harrison

Posted on Wednesday, April 29th, 2009 by Chloe

kateharrisonsecretshopperunwrapped Kate Harrison’s last novel “The Secret Shopper’s Revenge” was a surprise success, and happily for those of us that enjoyed that book, there’s going to be a sequel!

The Secret Shopper Unwrapped is due to hit our shops on 1st October 2009, and looks like its going to be just as good as the first. Here’s the synopsis:

“Christmas is coming, and while the bells are ringing, the tills aren’t. But Sandie - the rising star of the retail spying world - is busier than ever, rooting out the best and worst in festive customer care through her company.

The former Charlie’s Shopping Angels are helping out, too. Glamorous widow Grazia is going undercover under the duvet at boutique hotels, in between dating a succession of toyboys and trying to remember which lie she’s told about her age. Meanwhile, not-quite-yummy mummy Emily investigates the child-friendliness of the high street with the help of three-year-old Freddie -when she’s not working flat out with her partner to save their fledging village shop from the un-festive credit crunch.

The shoppers are back - but is the happiness they’ve worked so hard for, about to disappear faster than a Louis Vuitton handbag in the Harrod’s sale? “

Posted in 2009 Releases, Book Cover, Book News | 1 Comment »

Book Reviews - Rumour Has It by Jill Mansell

Posted on Wednesday, April 29th, 2009 by Chloe

Tilly Cole is happy working in London, but realises that life isn’t going to plan when her latest boyfriend moves out while she’s at work. She decides she’s had enough and moves to the small town of Roxborough where her best friend Erin lives.

She gets a job working for a gay Interior designer and his daughter, basically as their dogsbody but soon begins to love village life. But when Max’s best friend Jack comes onto the scene, Tilly is knocked for six as she wasn’t expecting to be attracted to anyone so soon.

Tilly is soon caught up in the lives and loves of all of Roxborough, but is she going to find love even when she doesn’t want it?

(more…)

Posted in 2009 Releases, Book Reviews, Rating: 5/5 | 1 Comment »

Book News: The Step-Mothers Support Group by Sam Baker

Posted on Tuesday, April 28th, 2009 by Leah

sambakerstepmothersupportgroup Sam Baker, editor of Red magazine and author of Fashion Victim and This Year’s Model, has a new novel out on 20th August (UK) called The Step Mothers-Support Group. The synopsis for the novel reads:

You can’t choose your family - but you can choose your friends…A sensational new novel about female friendship. Eve has never imagined herself as a stepmother. But when she falls in love with Ian, he comes with a ready-made family of three children. And, to make matters worse, he’s a widower. The ghost of his glamorous and well known wife haunts them. Clare, a teacher and single mother, is Eve’s best friend. She is the only person Eve can talk to about how to win round three hostile children. But despite Clare’s years of practice with her own teenage daughter, it’s her younger sister Chloe who provides the truly sympathetic ear. Mel is the high achiever, sent along to Eve’s so-called ‘support group’ by a colleague. Her new boyfriend has a ten-year-old daughter and she knows that if the relationship is going anywhere, she is going to have to meet her. And Mandy is the stay-at-home mum, whose relationship comes with stepchildren, and who wants more than anything to stitch together a new family life for herself and her kids. As a cup of coffee turns to a bottle of wine and the get-togethers become a regular fixture, the women share their love lives, their ambitions - and their feelings about their new families. But their friendship is tested when they are forced to confront new futures as well as unwelcome figures from the past!

It sounds an interesting read.

Posted in 2009 Releases, Book News | 2 Comments »

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Archive for April, 2009

Author of the Week: Milly Johnson

Book News: May 2009 Releases Part 2

Book News: May 2009 Releases Part 1

Book Review: The Reading Group by Elizabeth Noble

Book News: May Releases from Little Black Dress

Book News and Cover: The Secret Shopper Unwrapped by Kate Harrison

Book Reviews - Rumour Has It by Jill Mansell

Book News: The Step-Mothers Support Group by Sam Baker

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