Author Archive

We all have a dark side…

Elizabeth Greene is devastated when her boyfriend of ten years leaves her for someone else. After a night of drowning her sorrows leads to an unexpected one-night stand, Elizabeth finds herself pregnant, alone and vulnerable.

Helen has just discovered she has a sister she didn’t know she had. Bored with her privileged life in France and driven by a need to gain her parents’ approval, Helen sets out to find her sister and reunite her with her long-lost mother. When her search leads her to Elizabeth the two women become closely linked. But their connection to one another is founded on a dark deception, with the truth having extreme consequences…

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This week’s author of the week is the hugely-talented & successful Carole Matthews. She has had 15 novels published and has her 16th novel, That Loving Feeling, out in September. Her novels include: For Better, For Worse, The Sweetest Taboo, The Chocolate Lovers Club & The Chocolate Lovers Diet and All You Need Is Love.

Carole Matthews is an international bestselling author of hugely successful romantic comedy novels. Her unique sense of humour has won her legions of fans and critical acclaim all over the world. Carole has presented on television and is a regular radio guest. When she’s not writing novels, television or film scripts she manages to find time to trek in the Himalayas, rollerblade in Central Park, take tea in China and snooze in her garden shed in Milton Keynes which is near London, England.

I love Carole’s style of writing - the way she writes chapters in first person and then chapters in third person. I wasn’t a fan of her earlier novels (Lets Meet on Platform 8, A Compromising Position, A Whiff of Scandal and More to Life Than This) but have enjoyed most of hers I’ve read since then. My favourite are the Chocolate Lovers Club and Chocolate Lovers Diet, they were both brilliant novels. From her stand-alone novels I enjoyed The Sweetest Taboo. I have All You Need is Love and Welcome to the Real World in my to-read pile also.

Carole’s next book, as I said, is out September 17th and is called That Loving Feeling. The synopsis reads: Juliet Joyce has been happily married for twenty-five years. But with two grown-up children who treat the house like a hotel, a seventy-year-old mother who’s just moved in and a father who’s announced he’s gay it’s hardly surprising that her relationship with her husband Rick is beginning to suffer.

Juliet’s resigned to the fact that the only romance she’s going to get is from the pages of her library books, so nothing prepares her for the unexpected return of Steven Aubrey. Last seen twenty-six years ago, when he jilted Juliet on their wedding day, he ignites a passion in her that she thought was long gone. But will Steven sweep her off her feet or can Rick remind her of the loving feeling that they’ve lost? There’s only one way to find out…

The cover hasn’t been released yet. It should be a good one, I love Carole’s latest cover designs and I love her books.

The synopsis for Julia Williams’ next novel, Last Christmas has appeared on Amazon.co.uk. It reads:

Catherine Tinsall is gearing up for Christmas - in the middle of summer. As the Writer in Chief on Happy Homes magazine, she is putting together a ‘perfect Christmas’ competition, to remind readers of the festive season’s true meaning. In the sleepy Shropshire village of Hope Christmas, Marianne Mistletan enters with the suggestion that her village’s nativity play be held in the ancient chapel of Fitzcross Manor, home to the St Nicholas family. Catherine is completely entranced by the idea, and Marianne to her delight finds that she has won. Waiting in the wings to help Marianne organise the set design is the cool and charismatic Joe Carpenter, who may or may not be just what she wants for Christmas. Meanwhile, for Catherine, the Happy Homemaker image is wearing thin, as her fifteen-year old marriage appears to be in trouble. Then tragedy strikes and Catherine is forced to reassess her priorities, and work out what the perfect Christmas really means. And overseeing it all, is the figure of John St Nicholas, lord of the manor and perhaps, for some, a Christmas angel! For anyone who’s wondered whether Christmas is over-priced hype, think again…

It sounds great and I loved Pastures New and have Strictly Love in my to-read pile. There is no cover up yet but I can tell you it’s called Last Christmas and is out in October.

Kerry Reichs, author of The Best Day Of Someone Else’s Life, returns with her second novel called The Good Luck Girl. It is released on August 9th and the synopsis reads:

Maeve Connolly is tired of being labelled as irresponsible. Yes, she may spend unhealthy amounts of time on Facebook and watch marathon sessions of America’s Next Top Model, but Maeve isn’t a typical post-college slacker. Determined to change her life and make her own luck, Maeve impulsively decides on a grand adventure - driving cross country to LA. But en route, Maeve’s car breaks down and she is stranded in Unknown, Arizona. It is here, alone and in the middle of nowhere, that Maeve finally faces up to the reality of her past. What Maeve has denied acknowledging, even to herself, is that she isn’t running from bad luck, but from something much more complicated - something that made her feel as though the world would never turn again, and her heart would always remain closed. What begins as a hilarious and quirky coming-of-age tale soon deepens into a complex portrayal of survivorship and one woman’s journey to a new beginning.

It sounds interesting. I haven’t read Kerry’s debut but that also sounds interesting too.

In the heart of County Kildare is Davenport Hall - a crumbling eighteenth-century mansion house, ancestral home to Portia Davenport, her beautiful younger sister Daisy and their dotty, eccentric mother, Lucasta.

Disaster strikes when their father abandons the family, cleaning them out of the little cash they had managed to hold on to. But a ray of hope appears when Steve Sullivan, an old family friend and confirmed bachelor, suggests that they allow the hall to be used as the location for a major new movie.

So Davenport Hall is taken over by the creme de la creme, including the self-centred Montana Jones, fresh out of rehab and anxious to kick-start her career, and Guy van der Post, a major sex symbol with an eye for Daisy. Throw in Ella Hepburn, Hollywood royalty and living legend, and soon there’s more sex and drama off-camera than on! And Portia, who’d completely given up on love, is in for quite a surprise… Read my review underneath…

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Here is the gorgeous cover for Sophie Kinsella’s next novel Twenties Girl. I got it from chicklitclub, and cannot find it anywhere else. As it says New York Times at the top, it could be an American cover but who knows? The synopsis for Twenties Girl, if you haven’t already seen it, reads:

Lara has always had an over - active imagination. Now she wonders if she is losing her mind. Normal twenty-something girls just don’t get visited by ghosts! But inexplicably, the spirit of Lara’s great aunt Sadie - in the form of a bold, demanding Charleston-dancing girl - has appeared to make one last request: Lara must track down a missing necklace Sadie simply can’t rest without. Lara’s got enough problems of her own. Her startup company is floundering, her best friend and business partner has run off to Goa, and she’s just been dumped by the love of her life. But as Lara spends time with Sadie , life becomes more glamorous, she dresses in beautiful vintage frocks and their treasure hunt turns into something intriguing and romantic. Could Sadie’s ghost be the answer to Lara’s problems and can two girls from different times end up learning something special from each other?

Christina Jones, author of Going the Distance, Running the Risk, Stealing the Show, Jumping to Conclusions, Tickled Pink, Hubble Bubble, Seeing Stars, Love Potions, Heaven Sent, Happy Birthday plus a few more has a new novel out on September 3rd called Moonshine. Christina Jones writes great novels from what I’ve read. I haven’t read any of her newest, magical novels but will see if I can find any, they sound interesting. The synopsis for Moonshine reads:

For Cleo Moon, some things just never go according to plan …Newly single and unemployed, Cleo Moon ups sticks and moves to the gloriously rustic hamlet of Lovers Knot. With its host of mad but delightful neighbours, she very soon feels at home, especially when she finds The Most Beautiful Boy in the World slumped on her doorstep - the drop-dead-gorgeous and achingly-upper-class Dylan Maguire. But when she is given the taxing task of organising the annual Harvest shindig, things start going HORRIBLY wrong for Cleo. She decides to dust off an old book on winemaking to concoct a new harvest tipple, and by the time she’s uncorked the first bottle, nothing in Lovers Knot will ever be the same again …

It sounds interesting and I love the cover, I like the black of it and I don’t think I’ve got a book with a black cover, it looks really great. (I am a HUGE cover fan - I love beautiful book covers!) If you want to find out more about Christina Jones, you can read her blog here.

This is a story for everyone who has ever wondered: How can I truly love the one I’m with, when I can’t forget the one who got away?

Ellen and Andy’s first year of marriage doesn’t just seem perfect, it is perfect. There is no question how deep their devotion is, and how naturally they bring out the best in each other.

But one fateful afternoon, Ellen runs into Leo for the first time in eight years. Leo, the one who brought out the worst in her. Leo, the one who left her heartbroken with no explanation. Leo, the one she could never quite forget.

When his reappearance ignites long-dormant emotions, Ellen begins to question whether the life she’s living is the one she’s meant to live. Read my review underneath!

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