The House We Grew Up In - Lisa Jewell

This book did not leave my hands for almost two days! (I have so much work to catch up with, now!)

The House We Grew Up In is a beautiful, sensitive portrayal of human frailty and the power of coping beyond what appear to be insurmountable obstacles.

Lisa Jewell deals with some serious subjects in this story and many of the topics are dark and difficult to read about, but, none of that stops this wonderful, well written book from being compelling!

When I realized that one of the central characters had a hoarding issue, I wondered if the whole thing might not be too dark and depressing to get through. It became apparent very quickly that the story was an essay on the human condition and that hoarding was just one facet of that condition. It turned out to be a very uplifting read in spite of all the difficult subjects involved!

This story will stay with me for a long time. In fact, I will definitely read it again because it is so well written, so beautifully haunting and such a great testimony to the human spirit.

It will be released in the US by Atria Books on August 12th, 2014.

If you want a moving, memorable and completely mesmerising read, this is the book for you.

9.9/10

A Cottage by the Sea – Carole Matthews

As summer is upon us, for the next few posts I will be reviewing books which are just perfect for reading to get into the mood for summer sunshine and happy holidays. The first in this collection is Carole Matthews’ latest book, A Cottage by the Sea.

Ella, Flick and Grace have been friends for years. They have shared heartaches and celebrations and although it is a while since they lived together at university, when Ella inherits Cwtch (pronounced Cutch)Cottage on the Welsh coast, she invites her two friends for a week away by the sea.

Grace is now married to Harry who is older than her and has become rather fond of drinking way too much these last couple of years. She feels the strain of their relationship as they seem to grow further and further apart so she is hoping that this week away with him and her friends and their partners will be just the boost they need to help their flailing marriage.

Ella and Art have been together for years. Art leads a rock and roll lifestyle looking after major rock bands. He often has to go on tour with them, leaving Ella behind. When she inherits Cwtch Cottage Art encourages her to sell it as it doesn’t really fit in with his image and lifestyle. Ella, however, has so many lovely childhood memories of visiting the cottage during the long summer holidays when she was growing up. She loves the place and cannot imagine selling up.

Flick is the wild one of the group. Single, with an eye for attached men, she rolls up to the cottage with the charming and handsome Noah who hasn’t met any of the rest of the group before.

The atmosphere is filled with expectation, hope and longing and what a week of discovery, forbidden love and surprises it turns out to be when they all spend time together in A Cottage by the Sea.

Let me start by saying that I love Carole Matthews’ books and this one did not disappoint. Set in and around a cottage by the beautiful South Wales seaside, this story is of three best friends who met at university and although they are still close, don’t get to spend as much time with each other as they used to. Ella decides to make up for that by inviting her friends and their other halves to her cottage for a week’s holiday together.

As the days pass by the group seems to fall into two parts with those who love to party, drink and stay up into the wee small hours and those who like to make the most of the beautiful scenery and feel happier watching the sunset rather than drinking sun-downer’s or having long lunches in nearby pubs.

A Cottage by the Sea is a lovely story of friendship, love, relationships and the South Wales seaside which is breathtakingly beautiful under Carole Matthews’ penmanship. If you want a lovely summer read that will take you on an interesting journey then this is the book for you.

9.8/10

The Angel at No. 33 – Polly Williams

Sophie and Jenny have been friends since university days when they met for the first time in their new dorm. Through thick and thin they have been there for each other. Sophie is now married to the smoulderingly handsome, Ollie, they have the adorable Freddie and her life seems perfect, whilst Jenny is still single, but still, they are more like sisters than just friends.

Jenny has been engaged for over a year, but, despite the fact that they agreed to a short engagement, there seems to be no sign of getting any closer to setting a date with Sam who is quite prepared to keep changing the subject when it comes up.

One night, after too much wine during a fabulous catch up get together, Sophie is hit by a bus and killed outright in front of Jenny. Everyone’s life changes from that moment on and Ollie, Jenny and Freddie have to begin to come to terms with the loss of the most pivotal and influential person in each of their lives.

When Ollie is lost and devastated and Freddie seems sad, the” Help Ollie campaign team” which consists of four mum’s who were friends of Sophie’s from her local neighbourhood, decide come the rescue . They forged a firm friendship with Sophie during hours of gossip waiting outside the school gate and bonded over school fundraisers and bake sales. They meet Jenny for the first time at Sophie’s funeral and plot to draft her into their ranks to lead the mission of cheering Ollie up and making sure Freddie gets more to eat than cereal or biscuits. Jenny begins to discover a side of Sophie she had no idea existed and is soon drawn into the lives of these generous women who each have troubles of their own.

This is a funny, beautifully written and touching story of love, motherhood, friendship and dealing with grief. The thing I liked most about it was that although Sophie lingers on after her death and is an observer and often a narrator of events that happen after her death in this story, she has very little or no physical influence on how things unfold and begins to think she is a useless ghost. Polly Williams draws a wonderful picture of how a person can influence those closest to them even after their death. She deftly paints a picture of how we feel the presence of our loved ones long after they have gone because of the impact they had on us during their lifetime.

It is the first Polly Williams book I have read and it will not be the last. I am so excited to have found her work.
9.8/10

The Vintage Teacup Club – Vanessa Greene

This is a story about three ordinary, but, very different women who meet under unusual circumstances when they each come across and fall in love with a vintage teaset. After a little deliberation (and a chat over a cup of tea) they decide rather than one of them take it, they will share it.

Alison is married to Pete and has two teenage daughters, Sophie and Holly. From all appearances her life seems ideal but her children are going through that “difficult phase” and Pete has recently lost his job, so Alison is carrying a lot of the financial burden for them all and feeling the pressure.

Jenny is about to marry Dan. They don’t have a lot of cash and are saving like mad for the perfect wedding. Then, out of the blue just weeks before her big day, Jenny hears from her mother who hasn’t been in touch with her or her family since she walked out when Jenny and her brother were very young.

Maggie moved from London a couple of years ago following the break- up of a long term relationship. She now owns a well-established florist which is gathering lots of local praise. When she gets the opportunity to do the flowers for a huge upcoming wedding she meets landscaper and designer, Owen, who she has to work with to stage the event. They get off to a very rocky start and it looks like she will lose the biggest contract she has landed so far.

The Vintage Teacup Club is a story about three women and their families and friends. They quickly become close through the shared love of vintage teacups and as the story unfolds so does their relationship with each other. It is a nice story of love, friendship and family ties. It is Vanessa Greene’s debut novel and a lovely read.

9.6/10

Table for Seven – Whitney Gaskell

On New Year’s Eve Fran and Will Parrish host a dinner party for a few of their friends and have the idea that they will serve a course on the hour every hour until midnight and so the party begins. All the guests have a lovely time and agree that this is a great way to spend an evening. That is when the Dinner for Seven Club is born.

As time goes by and the dinner parties become monthly events, it soon becomes clear that there is much more going on in the lives of the Table for Seven Club members than it first appears. Will and Fran’s marriage seems rock solid, but, the strain of dealing with an uncommunicative teenage daughter and what seems to be the methodical, uneventful passing of the years starts to produce cracks in their relationship. Audrey, is usually the target of Fran’s well intended match making but she needs to find her own way to move on after being widowed seven years previously. Audrey and Fran’s perfectionist friend, Jamie, the second wife of Mark, suspects him of having an affair. Will’s oldest friend, Coop, is a confirmed bachelor and doesn’t know how to handle being in love so steers well away from it. Will and Fran’s neighbour, Leland, a retired Judge, enjoys the company. It is a change for him to spend time with younger people and he brings wise counsel and insightful guidance to the group. The Dinner for Seven Club changes all of their lives forever.

This is a lovely book about friendship, relationships, love, emotional support and of course, food! Whitney Gaskell weaves the characters together perfectly and it is instantly clear how each person is connected to the other. As the story develops so the relationships between them all change and grow. Some bonds get stronger, some start to fracture and some break altogether. It is because of the prose and realistic conversation that this book is so enjoyable. It is funny and poignant at times and provides the reader a great way to escape for a few hours.

Table for Seven is the first book of Whitney Gaskell’s I have read and it will not be the last. I checked out her website to see what else she has written and found that she writes a really funny blog too. I love her sense of humour, wit and the frequent, seething road rage she feels when in the school drop off queue. She doesn’t mind using the odd profanity to make a point clearer and sharper, which in my mind puts her right into the “my kinda gal” category. Check out her website here: http://whitneygaskell.com

Table for Seven will be released in April 2013 and is available for pre-order on Amazon.com

9.8/10

A Glass of Blessings - Barbara Pym

In the late 1950's, Wilmet Forsyth is nearing her thirtieth birthday. She lives in a suburb of London with her husband, Rodney and her mother-in-law, Sybil. Wilmet met Rodney in Italy during WWII. Back then he was a dashing Officer in the Army and she was a young woman serving in the WREN's. In the intervening years Rodney has put on a few pounds, begun to lose his hair and his job at the Ministry keeps him busy.

An acute observer of her surroundings and particularly of the happenings in the local church, Wilmet embarks on a journey of discovery which sees her yearning after a little adventure in her life, especially as Rodney prefers her not to work she feels she must fill her time somehow. As they are proposing to take a holiday in Portugal in the summer, she and Sybil decide to take Portuguese lessons and who should be their tutor but the enigmatic Piers Longridge, the brother of Wilmet's oldest and best friend, Rowena. Soon she finds Piers occupying her thoughts a little more than perhaps is proper for a married woman.

A Glass of Blessings was published in 1958 and was the fifth of seven books written by Barbara Pym. It is the first of her books I have read and it will not be the last. Pym's observations of people and their foibles are faultless. Through Wilmet Forsyth's thoughts and comments she masterfully and without malice, paints an intricate picture of life in middle-class London in the late 1950's. Her perceptive insights into the character and expectations of the cast in the story produce an excellent essay on suburban life of the time. The language is clever and the dialogue erudite, witty and delightful. This book was an enjoyable find for me and offers the reader a journey back in time to late 1950's England. It is charming, insightful and historically accurate. There were several things described in the book that I remember my grandmother having in her house when I was a child in the late sixties.

Barbara Pym intrigued me as I had not heard of her work before so I read a little about her life after reading this book. I can easily see why in 1977 she was nominated by both David Cecil and Philip Larkin as the most underrated writer of the century.

If you like journeying back in time, this is just the book to take you on a great ride.

9.7/10

Leaves - Michael Baron

Leaves is set in the Connecticut River Valley during the month of October, when the leaves on all the trees there turn into a vivid array of assorted colours and hues as autumn arrives and they begin to fall. Here we meet the Gold family siblings who were brought to the valley from Long Island thirty two years earlier by their parents. After they arrived Bethany and Joseph Gold decided to stay in the Valley with their five children and to open The Sugar Maple Inn .

The Inn has been the cornerstone in the lives of Maria, Maxwell, Dorothy, Corrina and Tyler and all their partners and children. Now though, following the recent death of their mother and with both their parents gone they jointly decide to sell the Inn to an organisation which operates country inns all along the Eastern Seaboard. The inn will be officially handed over on November 1st. So as October begins the brothers and sisters prepare for the last days of ownership of the place which has played such a huge role in their lives and holds so many memories and ghosts from the past.

October is traditionally a very busy month in the Valley, especially as tourist (locally known as “tree peepers”) come from all over the country and indeed the world, to see the phenomenon of the beautiful Autumn leaves. The rooms at the Sugar Maple Inn are usually all taken way ahead of time and this year the restaurant, which is run by Deborah Gold, is fully booked too. Deborah is renowned for her culinary skills, particularly her sauces which always surprise and delight. Since the Gold’s opened the Inn, all those years ago, they have hosted a Halloween Party for all the people in the town as well as their guests. It is a tradition that has never been broken and this year is no exception. The show will go on even though head organiser, Mrs Gold, is no longer there. The children join together to make it happen, but, tempers fray and tensions rise as the event gets closer. We join the Gold’s on October 6th, 25 days before the party.

This is a lovely story of love and loss and family ties. It looks at people experiencing various stages in their life and relationships and examines how these events affects them. The Gold family have always been close and Michael Baron explores what happens to that closeness when the pivotal anchors are no longer there. The story does have a large cast of characters but because the focus stays on them, it is easy to keep track of who’s who. I really wanted to know what happened next by the end of the story and was delighted to read that Michael Baron plans to write more books about the Gold’s. As each of the siblings is at the beginning of something when this first book ends, is it easy to see where the material might come from.

Intriguingly, Michael Baron is the pseudonym of a well known author whose work is of a different genre than the books penned by Michael Baron. On his website he doesn’t show a photo of himself and says that the work he writes under his real name is much at odds with this work. I REALLY want to know who he is.............

I did enjoy reading this book. It is mostly warm and feels good. An ideal story to read sitting in front of the fire in late autumn or winter, especially as it also has a little touch of magic thrown in.

9.6/10