Open main menu

Changes

no edit summary
|summary=Jane de Rochefoucault, an expat living in Paris with her aristocratic husband, is just an ordinary mother fighting her way through the challenges of early parenthood from nursing to itsy-bitsy-spidering. However, Jane's life certainly isn't all about diaper-changing and Tupperware. Far from it. When three of her Muslim friends decide to organise a highly dangerous slave emancipation Jane is forced to rely on her family's history of law-breaking and dodgy contacts to make sure the plan succeeds. And on top of all her maternal and culinary responsibilities Jane becomes the interpreter/secretary/personal shopper for a celebrity intellectual employer which isn't all it's cracked up to be.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846272246</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Elizabeth Noble
|title=The Way We Were
|rating=4.5
|genre=Women's Fiction
|summary=When Susannah comes across her old flame Rob at her brother's wedding, she instantly remembers all of the things that she loved about him. She cannot stop thinking about him and by doing so it makes her see her partner Doug in not such an attractive light. Doug pays her very little attention and often does not include her in his plans with his children. They seem to merely co-exist rather than share a life together which causes Susannah to become more and more dissatisfied, especially when she compares him with Rob. Although Rob has recently married, he starts meeting with Susannah in London on a regular basis and the flame is soon rekindled. However, they know that if they take things further, other are bound to get hurt.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141043113</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Pamela Fudge
|title=Never be Lonely
|rating=4
|genre=Women's Fiction
|summary=There was a moment when Francesca Dudley wondered quite what she was doing in a church in Canada. She'd barely recovered from the lengthy flight and here she was listening to people extol the virtues of Mitchell Browning, now deceased. Francesca hadn't seen him since he left the family home when she was four and now, four decades later, she was coming to terms with the fact that her father had still been alive, only to find that he was dead – if you see what I mean. Mitchell has not just left her fatherless though – there seems to be a whole tribe of people bereaved by his death and at least one of them doesn't seem all that keen that she should be there.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0709092539</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Fiona Mountain
|title=Isabella
|rating=4
|genre=Women's Fiction
|summary=The fate of mutineer, Fletcher Christian in the 18th century remains a mystery even today but Fiona Mountain has pieced together a dramatic and powerful story based on rumours and clues that Fletcher returned to England to be with his long-lost love, Isabella Curwen. Fletcher, the son of a bankrupt family and Isabella, the sole heiress of a huge fortune are prevented from marrying. Their relationship is manipulated by those around them and a young, naïve Isabella is forced to marry her cousin, John.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099562251</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Rowan Coleman
|title=Lessons in Laughing Out Loud
|rating=5
|genre=Women's Fiction
|summary=Willow Briars is in her thirties and cannot exactly claim that her life is successful. Acrimoniously divorced, having no contact with her stepdaughter and working too many hours for a tyrannical boss, she cannot help but compare her life with her twin sister Holly's. But Holly has not had to live with the trauma that Willow endured as a child even though she has always been there to support and help her. However, one day she stumbles upon and old and tucked away second hand shop with a wonderful pair of shoes in the window that seem to be calling out to her. The shoes seem to transform Willow; not only her stature and looks but also her confidence and the way she sees herself. Also, the people who know her appear to be looking at her differently too. Transformed, she feels ready to tackle anything life has to throw at her which is probably a good thing when her fifteen year old stepdaughter turns up on her doorstep, pregnant and having run away from home.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099551268</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Rosie Thomas
|title=The Kashmir Shawl
|rating=4
|genre=Women's Fiction
|summary=Mair Ellis and her two siblings are busy clearing out their parents' house shortly after their father's death, when Mair comes across an old package in a chest of drawers. Unwrapping the parcel from its tissue paper, Mair discovers an exquisite and expensive, hand woven Indian shawl from Kashmir, intricately woven and full of wonderful colours. Falling out of the shawl is an envelope containing a lock of hair, adding to its already mysterious nature.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007285965</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Elisabeth McNeill
|title=East of Aden
|rating=3
|genre=Women's Fiction
|summary=It was said that something strange happened to women when they went east of Aden. The normal rules of behaviour seemed to have been left at home and anything – well just about anything – seemed to go. Back in the early nineteen sixties three women met in Bombay. How would they fare in the hot climate? It wasn't just the women who changed when they went out to India, either. How would the husbands of Jess, Joan and Jackie cope when sex seemed to be freely available wherever they looked?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0709092458</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Karen Abbott
|title=A Father For Daisy
|rating=4
|genre=Women's Fiction
|summary=Beatrice Rossall found herself in a difficult position. Her widowed father was an elderly vicar who took in a young unmarried girl who was expecting a baby. Soon after the baby's birth the mother died and Bea's father died not long after, leaving Bea in charge of Daisy who was only a few weeks old and with the prospect that she would have no home within a matter of days. She couldn't get work because of Daisy – with a lot of people believing that she was Daisy's mother – but she wasn't going to let Daisy go to the workhouse. At the end of the nineteenth century this wasn't a good position to be in.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0709092415</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Chima Njoku-Latty
|title=Thoroughly Modern People: The Long Way Home
|rating=2.5
|genre=Women's Fiction
|summary=The front cover graphics are good: interesting and refreshingly modern and when I opened the book I liked the easy-on-the-eye print format. And I think that's where my positive comments end. The back cover blurb says that this book is ''A beautifully moving story.'' I found it neither beautiful nor moving, I'm afraid.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0956600107</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Adele Parks
|title=About Last Night
|rating=4
|genre=Women's Fiction
|summary=I've noticed a trend in recent women's commercial fiction titles of rather dark subject matters. It seems that the light-hearted romps involving shopping and shoes are out and the subjects have grown up and become much more serious. This latest from Adele Parks certainly deals with some weighty issues. Steph and Pip have been best friends since they were at school together. They've supported each other through everything, and although they both find themselves living very different lifestyles they are still best friends. Or at least, that's what they think until Steph desperately needs Pip's help after one eventful night and Pip suddenly isn't sure if she can help her best friend.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0755371291</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Gabrielle Donnelly
|title=The Little Women Letters
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=I read the back cover blurb with delight and couldn't help but applaud Donnelly for her ingenuity. I loved the book ''Little Women'' when I read it many years ago and television adaptations keep it fresh for new generations. So, before I'd even turned to chapter one, I was loving this book. But will it live up to my lofty expectations?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0718156587</amazonuk>
}}