BOOKSIMO

Description Poppy never thought her husband wanted children - especially not with her best friend. When Poppy arrives home to find her husband and best friend sitting side by side at her kitchen table, she thinks they're planning her a birthday surprise . . . Little does she know, they're waiting to tell her about their affair. And worse, that they're having a baby. Now everywhere she goes, mothers are reminding her of their betrayal. So when Poppy meets a woman who wants to help her fight back, it seems like a good idea. But how well does she know her? Is she there to help . . . or does she have an agenda of her own? Review I really enjoyed reading this book - so much so I finished it in a few sittings. I thought the characters in this second book by the author were much more developed than in the "Fifth Letter", we even get to read a kind of diary that one of characters is writing, and all I could think was how do you go about writing somet...

Description A bold, sharp, gripping debut about a couple whose perfect life in the Swedish countryside is not what it seems… In an idyllic house in a Swedish wood, Merry and her husband are building their new dream life with their young baby, far away from events that overshadowed their old life in New York. And they’re happy, aren’t they? Blissfully, blissfully happy. When Merry’s childhood friend Frank comes to stay, Frank barely recognises her old friend Merry, pureeing baby food, baking, living the Swedish dream. But little by little, cracks begin to show in her carefully constructed fairy tale. And Frank starts to see things others might miss. Dark and treacherous things. And then a terrible tragedy unfolds… Review I should have seen the warning signs in the blurb when it said "Dark and treacherous things" but I really wasn't prepared for how disturbing this book is. It will depend on your own sense of the world and the fact that it is only a book - ...

Description The New York Times bestselling author turns the clock back to a time when two young girls convinced the world that fairies really did exist… 1917: When two young cousins, Frances Griffiths and Elsie Wright from Cottingley, England, announce they have photographed fairies at the bottom of the garden, their parents are astonished. But when the great novelist, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, endorses the photographs’ authenticity, the girls become a sensation; their discovery offering something to believe in amid a world ravaged by war. One hundred years later… When Olivia Kavanagh finds an old manuscript and a photograph in her late grandfather’s bookshop she becomes fascinated by the story of the two young girls who mystified the world. As Olivia is drawn into events a century ago, she becomes aware of the past and the present intertwining, blurring her understanding of what is real and what is imagined. As she begins to understand why a nation once believed in fairies, will...

Description It is summer 1989 and fifteen-year-old Clotilde is on holiday with her parents in Corsica. On a twisty mountain road, their car comes off at a curve and plunges into a ravine. Only Clotilde survives. Twenty-seven years later, she returns to Corsica with her husband and their sulky teenage daughter. Clotilde wants the trip to do two things - to help exorcise her past, and to build a bridge between her and her daughter. But in the very place where she spent that summer all those years ago, she receives a letter. From her mother. As if she were still alive. As fragments of memory come back, Clotilde begins to question the past. And yet it all seems impossible - she saw the corpses of her mother, her father, her brother. She has lived with their ghosts. But then who sent this letter - and why? Review The synopsis of this book really hooked me in, but when I began to read the book I struggled to stay with it. I found it very slow and boring for the most part. It is...

Description When Sophie Bennings arrives in New York, love is the last thing on her mind. Still reeling from a painful break up, she throws herself into her work as a food editor on a top-notch magazine. Columnist Todd McLennan is everything that Sophie wishes she didn’t want. Like the gorgeous bakery below her Brooklyn apartment, he’s as tempting as the sugary cupcakes on daily display. Surely a little of something you fancy can do you good? As Sophie and Todd get to know one another, a love of food isn’t the only passion they share. In the city that never sleeps, has Sophie finally met the man of her dreams…? Review This is pure chick lit and I just loved it. I read it in a couple of sittings and couldn't wait to get back to it. Being set in New York was a winner right off for me, but the writing was so wonderful that I really felt I was there. Thank goodness for Google street view as I found myself looking up some of the locations in the book, including the Broo...

Description A funny and heartwarming debut for fans of Rachel Joyce and Cathy Hopkins. Evie Gallagher is regretting her hasty move into a Dublin care home. She may be seventy-five and recently widowed, but she’s absolutely not dead yet. And so, one morning, while the rest of Sheldon Lodge is asleep, Evelyn walks out the front door and never looks back. So begins a road trip that will take Evie first to Liverpool, then on to Brittany, where she buys a camper van and heads south on a Great Adventure. But not everyone thinks Great Adventures are appropriate for women of Evie’s age, least of all her son Brendan and his wife Maura, who set off in pursuit, following a trail of puzzling text messages. But when Brendan and Maura finally catch up with Evie, there are shocks in store for all of them … because while Brendan may have given up on life and love, Evie Gallagher certainly has not. Review What an absolutely charming book this is. We meet Evie in Sheldon Lodge -...