the house we grew up in A Gripping Easter Novel by Lisa Jewell

Are you a hoarder? I am a bit; it didn't take long to find some gift wrap to use as the background for my photo here.  But Lorelei Bird has more of a problem: she's unable to throw away anything and her house has become literally stuffed full of junk or, as she calls it, her memories of good times. Each item a reminder of a particular day or event.
She started by collecting things for her craft box which she kept under the stairs, particularly the shiny foil wrappers off the Easter Eggs she hid around their lovely garden each Easter Sunday.
Thirty years ago, the Birds were a perfect family: Lorelei, Colin, Megan, Beth and the twins Rory and Rhys living in their perfect house in the country, until one Easter, something happened that was so terrible that it destroyed their life altogether.
Lisa Jewell has written a jewel of a book. Weaving backwards and forwards in time, each Easter from then to 2011, she unravels their story and temps us to discover who was actually to blame for the disastrous event.
It is not a traditional Easter story with bunnies and fluffy chicks; it is quite harrowing to read in places, but it is a story that grips your attention, so you keep reading, caught up with their lives, until the end.
Do you have a favourite Easter novel?

CS Lewis, The Last Battle and The Total Eclipse

Back in 1999 when Britain was getting ready to watch only the second total eclipse of the twentieth century, the Daily Mail ran an article about the first one which took place on June 29th 1927.
The best place to view it was the Yorkshire Dales, and to quote the paper, people arrived there 'by plane, ship, railway, car, charabanc, omnibus, motorcycle and pushbike'.
Virginia Woolf even arrived by train with other members of the Bloomsbury set.
The Mail included the report of their very own correspondent who described seeing the total eclipse through a break in the clouds with a crowd of fifty thousand on Richmond racecourse.
He (or she!) described the increasing chill in the air as the light 'insensibly decreased', until the sun hung in the east like the brightest and most splendid new moon. The world now waited, dark and cold in a 'ghastly grey-yellow, gloom'.
'The waves of blackness, accompanied by an icy breath, were rushing on faster and faster as though the sky was full of groups of lights that were being put out one by one, and suddenly, as if with one fell swoop, it was night - night dense, sinister, an muffled in silence'.
Anyone watching the eclipse could not help believing, for the few minutes of totality, that the end of the world was at hand.

It was interesting to read that amongst the crowds heading for Yorkshire, the Daily Mail correspondent mentioned that there were some 'college dons'.
Now, in 1925, CS Lewis became a Fellow and Tutor in English Literature at Magdelen College, Oxford, so it's quite possible that he made the trip up to witness the eclipse.
This is even more likely if you read his account of  the end of Narnia, in The Last Battle.
In the chapter, Night Falls on Narnia, he describes the moon coming up close to the sun and how the sun's great red tentacles reach out for it and surround it until they were like one huge ball of burning coal. Then Aslan asks a giant to squeeze the sun as he would an orange. And instantly, there was total darkness.
It's nice to think that that CS Lewis might have witnessed the eclipse in 1927 and made some notes to be used nearly thirty years later in his final Chronicle of Narnia.

Don't wait two years to read The Italian Wedding by Nicky Pellegrino like I did!

I bought The Italian Wedding by Nicky Pellgrino two years ago, and can't understand why I didn't read it sooner!
It's got all my favourite things: weddings, cooking and Italy, of course!
The book starts straight off with Beppi Martinelli's recipe for aubergines in tomato sauce with mozzarella and parmesan: Melanzane alla Parmigiana. It's sounds delicious, and even better in Italian!
Beppi's daughter, Pieta, can't understand the long feud her father has with Gianfranco DeMatteo who owns a grocer's shop near their restaurant, Little Italy, in London.
She works for a wedding dress designer, and she is concerned to find that her latest customer is Helene who is to marry Gianfranco's son, Michele, the boy she has always wanted for herself. However, at home, she is making a wedding dress for her sister, Addolorata, and whilst she and her mother, Catherine, sew on the tiny shimmering beads, Catherine tells her the story of how she and Beppi met  in Rome, and the part Gianfranco played in the story.
It is a lovely picture of Italy all those years ago: all Vespas and full skirts, mixed with the relationships of the young people of today, and I can thoroughly recommend it for a satisfying read.

The Peacock Emporium by Jojo Moyes is full of treasures. And great news about a new release!

The Peacock Emporium by Jojo Moyes is many stories in one and, rather like the shop itself, it's full of treasures. Susanna Peacock runs the Emporium, but it's also about her parents Vivi and Douglas; Athene Forster, nicknamed the 'Last Deb' in the Sixties, and her reckless life; and Jessie, a young outward-going young mother who helps Susanna make a go of her business.
Jojo is very clever at making up a cast for her novels, and to read them is always like watching a film in my head. This book is no exception and the action takes place at the main locations of the Emporium and the family estate run by Douglas and his son, Ben.
There is also the added spice of Alejandro, a midwife, who has left his native Argentina because of the troubles there to make a new life in England and is a regular at the cafe in the shop.
Susanna doesn't fit into her family and feels that her sister, Lucy, and Ben are favoured more than her. However, her father lets her and her husband, Neil, live in a cottage on the farm, because he's lost his job. She doesn't feel ready to have a child yet because of her dream of owning a shop and making an identity for herself, so Neil agrees to her running it for a year, if she will then try for a baby.
However, she's attracted to Alexjandro, who is friendly to both her and Jessie, with distastrous consequences.
I had to keep reading to find out what Susanna would do next and also uncover the family secret which has been the root of her unhappiness.
Reading this book means that I have read all of Jojo's books apart from the novella, Paris for One, for which there's really no excuse! However, the big news for all her fans is that the sequel to Me Before You, called After You, will be out on September 24th 2015!
I can't wait!
Which is your favourite Jojo Moyes book?

Snowdrops and Writing

February is the month for snowdrops. Hidden, peeping out from under trees and bushes, you can hardly see them, but they herald the end of snow and winter, and hint of the yellow daffodils and bright tulips that are yet to come.
These snowdrops were given to me by a friend and nestle at the bottom of a giant Christmas tree, planted about fifty years ago in the garden by the previous owners and, protected through the cold weather by the brown curly leaves of summer, they represent re-growth.
Perhaps, writing is like that.  Sometimes it is hard to begin to write; life gets in the way. But all the time, just like the little snowdrop bulbs, ideas are pushing away under the surface, nurtured by the life itself and its experiences and suddenly burst forth urging to be written down.
Have snowdrops, or other spring flowers inspired you to write?

Missing Dancing on Ice? Read Torvill and Dean's autobiography - Our Life on Ice instead!

Sunday evenings this winter aren't the same without Dancing on Ice. Settling down with a Winter Pimms and some twisty cheese straws for a couple of hours with our favourite celebrity skaters was bliss.
But no longer, 2014 was the last series, and for the moment Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean have hung up their skates (but not before we went to see their Final Live Tour at Wembley Arena!)
However, I was excited to receive their autobiography Torvill and Dean Our Life on Ice for Christmas with their trademark sparkly purple cover! Actually written by James Hogg, an established ghost-writer and biographer for sports and entertainment: the two spheres well-represented by this skating couple who not only won Olympic Gold for Bolero in Sarajevo in 1984, but since then have danced professionally on ice in many world tours and shows.
It is written in a documentary style with Jayne and Chris mostly separately, but sometimes together, talking about their childhood, their beginnings on ice and how they were put together as a pair one cold Thursday morning at Nottingham ice rink. They mention their mentors, such as Betty Callaway, and how their amateur career developed culminating in that unforgettable Olympic win.
They talk about their special working relationship, and their marriages to others. However, if you want to find out if they really had that romance that the media seemed to think they were hiding, you'll have to read the book!

I'll Take New York by Miranda Dickinson - A Real Romance!

I've been looking forward to reading I'll Take New York by Miranda Dickinson and I wasn't disappointed; I think it's her best novel yet!
A real romance: not too fluffy and not too gritty.  Just right!
It's her sixth novel and, although not a sequel, its characters are connected to Rosie and Ed in her first one, Fairytale of New York.
Ed's brother, Jake, who moved to San Francisco for his wife, has been told by her that she wants a divorce.
Bea, from England like Rosie, runs a bookshop with her college friend, Russ. She's been let down in front of her family by her boyfriend, Otis.
Meeting up at a party where Jake is helping out in the bar, they agree on a Pact not to have another relationship with anyone and make the most of their single lives. However, their lives get more complicated than they expected!
I think that Miranda does a great job of writing the dialogue for the American characters. It comes over as being very believable. I loved the settings too, for example, the bookshop when Bea and Russ put on a birthday party, and of course New York which takes star billing with the Wollman Ice Rink in Central Park.
The story is told from Bea and Jake's points of view and I couldn't wait to find out what happened to them in the end.
Which is your favourite Miranda Dickinson book?