There are a lot of releases in February. I rather like the sound of most of them due out and hope to get my hands on them all!
Carole Matthews - It’s Now or Never - 4th February 2010
Can it ever be too late to chase your dreams? The witty, clever and heartbreaking new novel from the bestselling author. When twins Annie and Lauren attend their sister Chelsea’s fortieth birthday party at the Dorchester Hotel, they wonder why their lives are so totally different from their gorgeous, glamorous sister.
Why is it that Chelsea’s handsome husband is twirling her round the dance floor, with an expression of utter devotion on his face, while Annie’s husband is away on a fishing trip and Lauren’s boyfriend is at home with his wife and kids. Surely, they are doing something wrong here.
The question is, is it too late for them to change…?
Chrissie Manby - Getting Over Mr Right - 4th February 2010
After more than two years together, Ashleigh is just waiting for Michael to pop the question. She’s sure she’s met her Mr Right.
But Michael has other things on his mind - namely, an interior designer from Brazil with big hair and an even bigger chest.
Out of the blue, Ashleigh finds she’s dumped. Via Facebook. Ashleigh is not the sort of girl to take this news lying down.
Instead, she embarks on a calamitous campaign to win Michael back. She’s staking everything she’s got.
She may have lost her man, but has she also lost the plot?
Julia Llewellyn - Love Nest - 4th February 2010
Roll the dice Grace’s childhood home, Chadlicote Manor, is being sold to settle family debts. Will losing her home break her heart or is it the chance for a new life? … move two spaces Karen’s husband has the Manor in his sights as a chance to start over in rural paradise. But Karen prefers city living and, when a new flame turns up the heat, starting again might just mean the end of the road. … climb the ladder
Gemma is longing for a baby and, unlike her own loft apartment, Karen’s house is an ideal family home. But the dream house can only have its dream baby if Gemma can convince her flakey sister to help out. … to land on Up-and-coming rockstar Nick has designs on Gemma’s flat. He’s also taken a shine to classy estate agent, Lucinda, but she’s not all she seems – and neither is he, since he’s hiding a girlfriend he’s looking to ditch when the sale goes through. . . . the Love Nest where all their troubles come home to roost!
Roisin Meaney - Love in the Making - 4th February 2010
Hannah Robinson is just about to open the doors to her new shop Cupcakes on the Corner when out of the blue her boyfriend Patrick announces that he’s leaving her for another woman. Faced with starting a business on her own, Hannah begins to wonder if her life-long dream has just turned into a nightmare.
So her best friend Adam sets his birthday as a deadline - seven months to make her shop a success, or walk away from it all. And as Hannah immerses herself in early-morning icing, she soon discovers that she’s too busy to think about Patrick and his now pregnant girlfriend . . . or to notice an increasingly regular customer who has recently developed a sweet tooth for all things cupcake . . .
But while Hannah is slowly piecing her life back together, family friend Alice’s is falling apart. Her husband Tom’s drinking is getting out of control and things are about to get a whole lot worse. As the seven-month milestone approaches, Hannah must decide her future. And while she’s figuring out what’s really important, it becomes clear to everyone that happiness in life, and in love, is all in the making.
Erica Bauermeister - The Monday Night Cooking Club - 4th February 2010
On Monday nights eight people gather in Lillian’s restaurant for a cooking class. There’s Claire, who can barely remember the last time she went out without her two kids; bachelor Ian, who exists on Chinese takeaways; Chloe, the distracted waitress who is forever dropping things; Carl and Helen, getting past a betrayal in their marriage; and Tom, mourning the tragic loss of his wife. Plus Lillian, who taught herself to cook to reach out to her unhappy mother. From delicious feasts to dining disasters, will the cooks find what they are looking for? And among the utensils and mouth-watering ingredients, will some of them even fall in love? The Monday Night Cooking School is a gorgeous novel about possibilities and the magic of food.
Theresa Rebeck - Twelve Rooms With A View - 4th February 2010
When a rich man you never knew dies and his opulent apartment is left to you, you’d think it was the answer to your dreams. But perhaps it is the start of a living nightmare! Possession is nine-tenths of the law. Or is it? Tina Finn was standing at the edge of her mother’s newly-dug grave when she first heard about her inheritance. Until this moment she’d been scraping by, living from one pay cheque to the next. But all that was about to change! Now she’s the proud owner of a huge luxury apartment overlooking Central Park. Things couldn’t get much better, right? Wrong. Her half brothers, left out of the inheritance, think that she has no right to the apartment and they want her out - by any means necessary. So that’s how Tina went from standing on the edge of her mother’s grave to squatting in a twelve room apartment in the centre of New York. Now she has it all, is she prepared to fight to the end to keep it?
Louise Douglas - Missing You - 5th February 2010
Fen works in a bookshop and is devoted to her young son, Connor, but she keeps herself to herself. Haunted by guilt and a terrible secret, Fen lives a compromised life, isolated from her family, far from home and too afraid of the past to risk becoming close to anyone. She is constantly looking over her shoulder, knowing that one day the truth will catch up with her.
Sean, on the other hand, is enjoying a seemingly perfect life. He has a successful career, lives in his dream home and adores his beautiful wife, Belle, and their six-year-old daughter, Amy. That is until the day Belle announces she has found someone else and wants Sean to move out.
Circumstance throws Fen and Sean together. Slowly their quiet friendship turns into something much deeper and the joy they find in one another eventually gives them the confidence to trust and love again. But will the past tear them apart just as they find happiness?
Sarah Webb - The Loving Kind - 5th February 2010
Romance writer, Libby Small, has just been dumped. By her agent, her publisher and now her husband and she’s finally had enough. So she’s over the moon when she’s given the opportunity to ghostwrite a novel for ex Miss Ireland, Lulubelle Ryan. Particularly as it means travelling around the world as part of Lulubelle’s entourage. Two months to write a raunchy bonk buster set in the glitzy world of modelling should be easy - right? Wrong! Especially when it becomes very clear to Libby that the story behind this book is very close to Lulubelle’s heart for a reason. There are some benefits though - and Lulubelle’s handsome and enigmatic manager, Leo, is certainly part of the attraction - if only Libby could forget about her other male addiction.
Alison Penton Harper - Housewife in Trouble - 5th February 2010
Helen has done the one thing she swore she never would: remarry. A few weeks after the drive-thru’ ceremony, the reality of it comes over her like a python dropping out of a tree – that she would henceforth wake up every morning next to snoring rhinoceros Rick, a man with all the subtleties of a brick coming through your living room window. Under the questionable tutelage of crazy Leoni, Helen vows to reinvent herself as a guilt-free, modern Superwife, and determines to master the innocent art of womanly deception.
Meanwhile, big sister Julia, 43, suffers a major crash-and-burn after the miraculous arrival of her new baby. Desperate to help her navigate a severe case of post-natal depression, Helen suddenly finds herself knee-deep in subterfuge . . . And that, possibly, is what distracts her when Helga, the Russian cleaning lady, attacks Rick with a chair . . .
So there we have it. An Elvis wedding in Vegas. A panic-stricken newlywed wife. A severely concussed husband who cannot keep a secret. What could possibly go wrong? Bags open. Cats everywhere. As Elvis said, ‘If you’re looking for trouble, you’ve come to the right place’ . . .
Megan Crane - Everyone Else’s Girl - 18th February 2010
Exactly ten days after I’d come back to care for my dad, it occurred to me that I had turned into a housewife. Not just any housewife. My mother. Kill me now…Meredith does things for other people. She irons clothes for her boyfriend, she attends her ex-best friend’s horrendous hen party for her brother (who’s about to marry the girl) and she moves back to her parents’ house to look after her dad when his leg is broken. She’s a good girl and that matters. But when she gets back home, all is not as Meredith remembered. Especially Scott, that geeky teenager from her old class at school. He’s definitely different now. And so, it seems, is she. One by one, her family and old friends start to tell her some home truths and Meredith begins to realise she’s not so perfect after all. Maybe it is time she stopped being everyone else’s girl and started living for herself..
Jill Mansell - Take A Chance On Me - 18th February 2010
Cleo Quinn doesn’t have the greatest track record when it comes to men, but now Will’s come along. Handsome and attentive, he could be her Mr Right. Things are definitely looking up for Cleo… apart from one small problem with a rather large ego. Johnny LaVenture, sculptor extraordinaire and her personal childhood nemesis, is back in Channing’s Hill and tormenting her as if he’d never been away.
Meanwhile Cleo’s sister Abbie has a problem of her own – husband Tom has become distant and withdrawn, and she’s determined to find out why. But will the shocking truth mean the end of their idyllically happy marriage? The sisters are about to discover that the past can come back to haunt you, and that love can flourish in the unlikeliest of places…
Dorothy Koomson - The Ice-Cream Girls - 18th February 2010
At only eighteen years of age, Poppy and Serena were the only witnesses to a tragic event. Amid heated public debate and scrutiny, the two glamorous teens were dubbed ‘The Ice Cream Girls’ by the press and forced to go their separate ways and to lead very different lives.
Twenty years later, Poppy is keen to set the record straight about what really happened, while married mother-of-two Serena wants no one in her present to find out about her past. But some secrets will not stay buried - and if theirs is revealed, their lives will start to unravel all over again …Gripping, thought-provoking and heart-warming, The Ice Cream Girls will make you wonder if you can ever truly know the people you love.
Erin Kaye - The Art of Friendship - 18th February 2010
I get by with a little help from my friends! Chance brought Kirsty, Clare, Janice and Patsy together fifteen years ago. But friendship has bound them through time. Until now. Over the years, In the small town of Ballyfergus, these four women have shared tears of joy and sorrow, countless glasses of wine and cups of tea. Men have come and gone, children been born and left home.
Life has taken them down paths they never expected, but through it all their relationship has endured. But all that’s about to change - this year their friendship will be tested as never before as: Widowed Kirsty falls in love with someone she shouldn’t. Patsy struggles to cope with her beloved husband’s redundancy and a shocking revelation from her daughter. Janice is forced to address ghosts from her past. Clare takes control of her life, only to discover that her new-found independence comes at a high price. Can the sisterhood survive the strains placed upon it and come through it unscathed?
Before Elizabeth Noble moved to Penguin, her books were published by Hodder. The covers weren’t too impressive - actually, I really didn’t like them - so since her move, Penguin have been busy making her old books look just as fantastic as her recent releases. The Reading Group and Alphabet Weekends are both due out on 25th February 2010 with their new covers and just how fantastic are they? I adore the cover for Alphabet Weekends.
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Hollie Hudson is happily married to husband Richard but craves one thing desperately: a baby. It’s all she’s ever dreamed about since she was a little girl and the fact she’s incapable of having a baby is driving her to distraction. After happening upon a leaflet for a surrogate Hollie comes up with the answer to all of her problems: she’ll ask her sister Scarlett to be her surrogate. 
Author Melanie Rose first came to my attention when I read her fabulous debut novel 
Adriana Trigiani’s novel Very Valentine is released in paperback this week (4th February), and has a brand new look too, and is very different from Adriana’s previous covers. Perhaps this will open up the appeal to her books to more readers, and I know I would certainly look twice at this book thanks to the new cover design. I much prefer it to the hardback version (right) and its nice to see publishers realise the cover of a book is becoming more and more important! Which do you prefer?
Eve doesn’t believe in a man coming to save the day for her - as the director of a dating agency, she thinks the bank balance and profile is the key to falling in love. So when she bumps into 2 friends visiting New York from Ireland, she doesn’t expect a lot of old emotions to be stirred up about their past, and feelings to come out that she’d pushed to the back of her mind. Rachel is loving the freedom from her restrictive husband and family life, and is enjoying time with her new friend Alex, but how far is Rachel going to go for happiness? And finally Nicky is feeling the guilt of leaving her son home while she holidays in NYC with Rachel, and is convinced she’s going to end up alone. She’s only come to shop but might leave with more than she bargained for. With 3 nights in New York, it’s going to be a trip the 3 women will never forget!
