Posts Tagged ‘Kate Harrison’

Emily, Sandie and Grazia are back! The Secret Shopping angels are still shopping, but this time they’ve got the Christmas season to contend with. Emily is happily living with Will and her son Freddie in their shop, but with the recession times are tough and Emily isn’t sure the shop can survive, never mind her relationship with Will.

Sandie is now running her own Secret Shopping business and living with boyfriend Tom but there’s something nagging Sandie in the back of her mind and soon that something is about to become crystal clear.

Finally, widow Grazia has decided its time to move on with her life and to get herself a man but is convinced her age is holding her back. With the season of goodwill and joy upon them, will the 3 women get their happy endings?

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3 women - each hell-bent on revenge against the shopping industry. Emily is a single mum who has been dumped by her husband and is stuck in London with baby Freddie, and trying to upkeep her lifestyle with a tiny budget. She’s struggling so when a mystery shopping job opportunity arises, she grabs it with both hands.

Sandie was a Store Manager of a huge department store but when things go terribly for her and she’s sacked, she feels lost and abandoned by the industry that she’s given her life to, and decides to join Shopping Angels to try to trip up her bosses.

Finally, the leader of the pack is Grazia, an Italian widow who has her own financial worries courtesy of her deceased artist husband. She sees something in the two young women that she likes and employs them as Shopping Angels - will the Angels get their revenge on the shopping world, or is it one mission too far?

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Following on from being yesterday’s Author of the Week, we give you an interview with Kate Harrison! If you aren’t aware who Kate Harrison is, she is the author of 6 novels and, according to Chloe, a very good one too! Chloe has read The Starter Marriage and The Secret Shoppers’ Revenge and says she enjoyed them both so if you’re looking for your first Kate Harrison novel those two would be the way to go! Now, onto the interview…

1. Describe your latest novel in a sentence.

Three very different women who’ve each lost something very special – their marriage, the love of their life, their career – check out the world’s worst customer service, but along the way find friendship, freedom and a more exciting future…

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Kate Harrison, this week’s Author of the Week, is the author of 6 novels with the 6th, the sequel to The Secrets Shoppers Revenge, The Secret Shopper Unwrapped out in October. Her 7th novel, currently untitled, is due out in 2011.

Kate was born in Wigan but moved around a lot as a child. After working for a news agency in Reading she joined the BBC as a researcher. She then became Education Correspondent until she decided she preferred the producer/director role and moved to London to work at Newsround. She also worked for Panorama before leaving the BBC in 2006 so she could concetrate on writing full time. Read more about Kate here.

Her novels are Old School Ties, The Starter Marriage, The Brown Owls Guide To Life, The Self Preservation Society, The Secret Shoppers’ Revenge & The Secret Shopper Unwrapped. I haven’t read any of Kate’s novels but, like a lot of books, have The Secret Shoppers’ Revenge on my to-be-read pile.

As well as being Author of the Week we have an exclusive interview with Kate which will be posted tomorrow so look out for that!

The shortlist was announced in April for the Melissa Nathan Award for Comedy Romance and the winner will be announced in a week on June 10th. The shortlist are:

The Secret Shoppers Revenge by Kate Harrison
Bridesmaids by Jane Costello
Recipe For Disaster by Miriam Morrison
A Winter’s Tale by Trisha Ashley
The Marriage Bureau for Rich People by Farahad Zama
The Importance of Being Emma by Juliet Archer

We’ll be sure to let you know who the winner is next week!

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? “