Where We Belong by Anstey Harris @Anstey_Harris @simonschusterUK #WhereWeBelong #BookReview

 

Cate Morris and her son, Leo, are homeless, adrift. They’ve packed up the boxes from their London home, said goodbye to friends and colleagues, and now they are on their way to ‘Hatters Museum of the Wide Wide World – to stay just for the summer. Cate doesn’t want to be there, in Richard’s family home without Richard to guide her any more. And she knows for sure that Araminta, the retainer of the collection of dusty objects and stuffed animals, has taken against them. But they have nowhere else to go. They have to make the best of it.

But Richard hasn’t told Cate the truth about his family’s history. And something about the house starts to work its way under her skin.
Can she really walk away, once she knows the truth?

Where We Belong by Anstey Harris was published by Simon and Schuster UK on 14 May 2020. My thanks to the publisher who sent my copy for review.

This review was previously published in the Daily Express.

Cate Morris has been made redundant, she and her son Leo have to leave their home. There’s no more money, it’s been a struggle for the past four years, since her beloved husband Richard died.

 

Against her better judgement, and because she has no choice, Cate and Leo pack up their home and move to Hatters Museum of the Wide World, intending to stay for the summer only.

 

Although Hatters was Richard’s family home, Cate and Leo have never visited before. Cate knows that Richard and his grandfather were close once, but that there was a huge family fall-out and the two men didn’t speak again. Now both of them are gone, and Hatters is looked after by Araminta, a woman of indefinite age who has devoted her life to the place, and doesn’t seem very welcoming.

 

Hatters was the life work of Richard’s grandfather and is packed with interesting and unusual artefacts. However, money is tight and it’s clear that the Board of Trustees would like to sell everything and take the money.

 

Cate and Leo become heavily involved in trying to save Hatters, and as they become more invested, Araminta begins to show her kinder side, especially towards young Leo.

 

Long-kept family secrets are gradually uncovered and Cate begins to learn more about the man that she loved for so long and how and why the awful tragedy that befell her small family came about.

 

This original and atmospheric novel is perfectly crafted. The characters are tenderly created and the setting of Hatters is wonderfully described.

 

An enchanting story of families, secrets and lies with a exquisite love story running throughout.

Praise for Where We Belong

‘Last but no means least is the beautiful second book from Anstey Harris . . . a perfectly crafted novel: beautifully written, insightful and tender – it’s simply stunning’ -- Fionnuala Kearney

‘Such a beautifully written and engrossing novel. I felt I knew Cate and Leo as friends at the end of it. I will miss them’  -- Jacqueline Ward

'Magical. Moving. Mesmerising. Anstey Harris has done it again. A book as rare and exquisite as the objects in Hatters museum. Complex and compelling. Riddled with secrets and lies, the love story shines like a beacon in the darkness and gripped me utterly. I could not look away for a moment. Superb!' -- Kate Furnivall

‘This beautifully written novel is not only absorbing and original, it will challenge preconceptions in the very best way' -- Katie Fforde

'Utterly enchanting' -- Heidi Swain

'An incredibly moving and atmospheric novel, as beautiful and complex and curious as the museum in which it is set' -- Beth O'Leary

'Having adored Anstey Harris’s first novel, I started this one with a mix of anticipation and trepidation. It couldn’t possibly be as good as The Truths and Triumphs of Grace Atherton, but I hoped I would like it anyway. I was soon drawn in, as I knew I would be, by Anstey’s assured and elegant writing. Gradually, the little hooks drew me in further, and before I knew it, I was thoroughly immersed in this mesmerising story of love, loss and friendship, set against a fascinating and unusual backdrop which is very much part of the clever plot. I loved these characters, especially Leo and Araminta, and I was completely swept along by the wonderful storytelling. This is an emotional story, heartbreaking in places, but joyful and uplifting in others. And what a great ending!' -- Susan Elliot Wright

'Absorbing, powerful and lovely. This book swept me away and then brought me home' -- Milly Johnson

Anstey Harris is based by the seaside in south-east England where she lives with her violinmaker

husband and two dogs. She teaches creative writing in the community, local schools, and as an associate lecturer for Christchurch University in Canterbury.

Anstey writes about the things that make people tick, the things that bind us and the things that can rip us apart. In 2015, she won the H G Wells Short Story Prize for her story, Ruby. In novels, Anstey tries to celebrate uplifting ideas and prove that life is good and that happiness is available to everyone once we work out where to look (usually inside ourselves). Her short stories tend not to end quite so well...

Things that interest Anstey include her children and granddaughter, green issues and conservation, adoption and adoption reunion (she is an adopted child, born in an unmarried mothers' home in Liverpool in 1965), stepfamilies, dogs, and food. Always food. She would love to be on Masterchef but would never recover from the humiliation if she got sent home in the first round.

www.ansteyharris.com

Twitter @Anstey_Harris

The Switch by Beth O'Leary @OLearyBeth #TheSwitch @QuercusBooks #BookReview

Ordered to take a two-month sabbatical after blowing a big presentation at work, Leena escapes to her grandmother Eileen's house for some overdue rest. Newly single and about to turn eighty, Eileen would like a second chance at love. But her tiny Yorkshire village doesn't offer many eligible gentlemen... So Leena proposes a solution: a two-month swap. Eileen can live in London and look for love, and L Leena will look after everything in rural Yorkshire.

But with a rabble of unruly OAPs to contend with, as well as the annoyingly perfect - and distractingly handsome - local schoolteacher, Leena learns that switching lives isn't straightforward. Back in London, Eileen is a huge hit with her new neighbours, and with the online dating scene. But is her perfect match nearer to home than she first thought?

The Switch by Beth O'Leary was published in hardback on 16 April 2020 by Quercus. The paperback will be published in January next year.  My thanks to the publisher who sent my copy for review.

This review was previously published in the Daily Express

Leena Cotton has a very successful career, she’s the youngest senior consultant at Selmount Consulting. She lives in a trendy Shoreditch apartment and has an equally successful boyfriend.

Leena has just had a panic attack in the middle of an important presentation and has been ordered to take two-months paid leave, immediately.

Eileen Cotton is Leena’s 79 year old grandmother, and lives in a small Yorkshire village. Her husband of many years has left and she’d really like to find love, but there are few eligible men around.

Leena seeks refuge with Eileen, and they realise that they could swap lives for a while. Eileen will move into Leena’s flat and try her hand at online dating, whilst Leena can spend some peaceful time in the country.

The Switch is funny, uplifting and beautifully written. O’Leary explores the real meaning of community spirit; having both Leena and Eileen thrust into their new neighbourhoods, and both of them discovering the joys of neighbourly support.

Packed with a cast of well rounded and cleverly crafted characters, this is a story of rediscovery. Leena and Eileen come to terms with a recent family tragedy that neither of them have dealt with very well. They learn more about themselves than either of them could have anticipated.

The Switch is feel-good fiction that will delight readers, especially during these times of disconnection from our friends and family. It is emotionally absorbing, witty and bursting with warmth. A treat for fans of Marian Keyes and Jill Mansell.

Praise for The Switch 

Beth has done it again! Warm, witty, and a cast of characters I wish I was friends with - I truly loved it!, Laura Jane Williams, author of Our Stop

Eileen Cotton proves you don't have to be in your thirties to be Bridget Jones. A triumph of a second novel, Anstey Harris, author of Richard & Judy Book Club pick THE TRUTHS AND TRIUMPHS OF GRACE ATHERTON

I am blown away. I didn't think Beth could top The Flatshare but she has. It sparkles with wit, warmth and compassion. It deserves to be huge!, Gillian McAllister, bestselling author of The Evidence Against You

Beth O'Leary has absolutely smashed it out of the park with The Switch. Brilliant, warm, funny, full of heart. Completely loved it!, Richard Roper, author of Something to Live For

Heartwarming and uplifting. Everyone should have an Eileen in their life!, Heidi Swain, SUNDAY TIMES bestselling author of THE CHRISTMAS WISH LIST

O'Leary does it again! The Switch is a warm, funny and feisty tale of generational location swapping that will have you laughing and tearing up in equal measure. Populated by a cast of characters you'll wish you knew in real life. It's an absolute joy from beginning to end, MIKE GAYLE, author of Half a World Away

Utterly charming and uplifting, The Switch is bursting with love and warmth and humour. Another wonderful book from Beth O'Leary, LOUISE O'NEILL, author of AFTER THE SILENCE

This delicious slice of feelgood fiction is a real tonic, Sunday Mirror

This sparky, upbeat romcom balances riffs on the generation gap with heavier topics including grief and infidelity, Mail on Sunday

You'll find yourself rooting for the main characters, especially Eileen, the real star of this cheerful novel. A perfect tonic for anxious times, The People

Beth studied English at university before going into children's publishing. She lives as close to the countryside as she can get while still being in reach of London, and wrote her first novel, The Flatshare, on her train journey to and from work.

She is now writing novels full time, and if she's not at her desk, you'll usually find her curled up somewhere with a book, a cup of tea, and several woolly jumpers (whatever the weather).

www.betholearyauthor.com

Instagram @betholearyauthor

Twitter @OLearyBeth

Just Like The Other Girls by Claire Douglas @Dougieclaire @PenguinUKBooks #JustLikeTheOtherGirls @MichaelJBooks

Una Richardson is devastated after the death of her mother. Hoping for a fresh start, she responds to an advertisement and steps into the rich, comforting world of elderly Mrs Elspeth McKenzie.

But Elspeth's home is not as safe as it seems.

Kathryn, her cold and bitter daughter, resents Una's presence. More disturbing is the evidence suggesting two girls lived here before.

What happened to the girls?

Why will the McKenzies not talk about them?

As the walls close in around her, Una fears she'll end up just like the other girls . . .

Just Like The Other Girls by Claire Douglas is published in paperback on 6 August 2020 by Penguin. My thanks to the publisher who sent my copy for review.


I am a huge fan of a prologue / teaser and Claire Douglas teases her readers extremely well in the first few pages of Just Like The Other Girls. The opening couple of paragraphs scream tension as we are left teetering on the edge, wondering just what is about to happen. We are then thrust back to October 2018 where an unknown girl is beginning her first day in new job. It's all very mysterious.

The main part of the story begins three months later, in January 2019. Lead character Una makes her way towards a grand house in Brighton where she's applied for a job as a live-in carer. Una gets the job and the reminder of the novel details just how that change works out for her.

Una has had it tough lately. Her beloved mother died recently, far too young, taken by cancer. She's recently split from her boyfriend Vince and her dead-end job in a Care Home pays peanuts. Certainly not enough for her to save up to go travelling, something that she promised her Mum that she would do.
This job as a live-in carer for Elspeth McKenzie sounds like the answer to her prayers. She's even prepared to put up with Elspeth's frosty daughter Kathryn, especially as she has her own suite of rooms, far bigger and better than the poky room she previously had in the flat that she shared with her best friend Courtney.

As Una settles into the job, and the house, it becomes clear that Elspeth really doesn't need a carer and that she's lonely and just wants someone to be there. Elspeth can be cruel at one moment, and then happy and affectionate the next. Una is unsettled by the whole set up and confides in Courtney, but is determined to stick it out.

However, when she discovers that both her predecessor and the girl before her are both dead, she becomes concerned, especially when she discovers how alike in looks all three of them are.

Claire Douglas excels in throwing red herrings into her plot. There were many times when I was sure that I'd figured out exactly what was happening, only to be thrown a curveball and put completely off track; exactly what I love in a book!

Around half way through the story, then tension really ratchets up. The author delivers a huge shock to the reader, and the psychological impact is great.

There are some great characters in this story who are developed well with their various layers being unpeeled slowly and surely over the course of the story. Elspeth's house itself is almost a character in itself, with secrets and mysteries bound up in its walls, and the overall beauty of the house hiding years of pain and sadness.

Not just an everyday psychological thriller by any means, this author delves into the heart of the family and looks at how past mistakes can have far reaching consequences for generations to come.

Extremely clever and wickedly twisty, I enjoyed every single page of this one. It is finely plotted with a cast of characters who hide so much and are really well developed.



Claire Douglas always wanted to write novels and, after many years of trying to get published, her dream came true when she won the Marie Claire Debut Novel Award in 2013 with THE SISTERS.

Her subsequent novels LOCAL GIRL MISSING, LAST SEEN ALIVE and DO NOT DISTURB all reached the Sunday Times top ten bestsellers list and are published in over fifteen countries. LOCAL GIRL MISSING was the bestselling crime debut of 2018 in Germany. Her fifth thriller, THEN SHE VANISHES is due for release in Ebook end of June 2019 and in paperback August 2019.

You can find Claire on Twitter at @DougieClaire, instagram as clairedouglasauthor or visit her Facebook page clairedouglasauthor.

Jigsaw Island by Lynne McVernon BLOG TOUR @lynnemcvernon #JigsawIsland @RandomTTours

On a holiday escape to the Greek islands, Annie Buchanan discovers what – and then who – is missing from her life… When single mother, Annie, and son Jude take a break away from Scotland to stay with her brother and friends on Symi, they find the warmth and support they need. As they ease into the relaxed rhythm of island life, old and new acquaintances change the course of their vacation. Whether it's for better or worse, Annie will discover when she visits the island of Leros. There she may be able to put together some of the missing pieces in her life and learn who her friends really are. But she cannot be prepared for some uncomfortable truths about the past and the dramatic way in which they will change the present for her... and Jude.

Jigsaw Island by Lynne McVernon was published in July 2020. As part of the #RandomThingsTours Blog Tour today, I am delighted to share an extract from the book with you.

ANNIE – June

TWO

‘Finding out where we come from helps us know where we want to go.’

Jude’s with the Westies on the strand. Gulls wheeling against a blinding white sky, needle cries, salt breeze buffing his skin, the slosh of a rogue wave drenching his trainers. Accidentally on purpose. Off the lead, Jack will stick close by him but Tatty will rush barking into the water regardless of the temperature or swell. He’ll dry the worst off her then slap the sodden towel against the fence on the way back up the lane. Jack is trotting obediently at his

side, naughty Tatty back on the lead. She’s an old lady now, should know better.

So, too, should Jude. Exclusion isn’t intended as a holiday at the seaside, even if it’s your home. I’m the one doing a detention, keeping an eye on him, going to work, running the house and, not least, starting the search. I return to the screen, hoping he’s remembered to put the dogs’ muzzles on when they leave the beach, and re-read the advice. The words lunge back at me.

‘...while people are not legally required to have a Counselling Interview, many adopted people have found it helpful and useful to meet with an adoption social worker.’

I have a personal dilemma over the Counselling Interview. To be honest, more of an internal fist fight. My polar positions are these: if I don’t go for counselling, I’ll be Annie Mega- Ego for being a know-all. If I do go, I could well start telling the counsellor her – or his – own job.

‘You’re a cocky besom, Annie,’ is what Granny Buchanan used to say to me, often followed by, ‘You take after your –’ Then she’d stop, and I’d wonder why. She knew, you see, genetically anyway, I couldn’t take after anyone in the family. But before she and I could have the nature versus nurture discussion, Granny did a bunk to that great distillery in the sky.

I was eleven, younger than Jude now, when Rosemary – Mum – told me I was adopted. It was just after my not-adopted brother, Fraser, found his courage and took off to points global. Thoughtful of her, what with me adoring the very guitar strings he plucked. He said, later, he’d been on pain of his life not to tell me I was adopted. Helluva big secret for a boy to keep, especially with me being as annoying as I’m sure I was. I was angry with him for not saying, though, I thought we were closer than that. Even so, I still missed him every nanosecond. It was around then I started calling my parents Rosemary and George, like he did, neither of us to their faces, though. Later, when The Truman Show came out, it was like watching the story of my life; nothing Truman and I had relied on was true.

Current thinking is that telling a child about their adoption should happen much earlier than I was, pre-school being the preferred age. What could I have told Jude when he was pre- school? There was certainly nothing appropriate I could have said about his father. And I was still in education myself. Bearing all this in mind, the least I can do, now, is give him some certainty. First there’s my tracing my birth family, then, if he wants, a DNA test on him to find out whether his daddy really did come from Zanzibar (ha!) or was just an Ali G impersonator from Tower Hamlets. All he knows now is that his father did a disappearing act. He accepts it because he knows he isn’t the only kid without a dad.

I had a WhatsApp chat with Shona, about it. She’s not adopted, definitely would have mentioned it, so she can’t really know what it’s like. One of her gems was: ‘Knowing where you come from wouldn’t change who or what you are now’. She’s right in a way, it wouldn’t, but it would give me the past that was taken from me. And it would mean Jude had at least some roots, given his father was a tacky question mark.

As for me, his mother? I’m an unfinished puzzle of some kind: my own birth parents – missing; true identity of Jude’s father – missing; reason for failed relationship – missing; any kind of relationship – missing; any reason for all the dire bits of my life – missing. Would finding those pieces make me feel whole? It’s inconvenient I’m not a celebrity or the BBC would swoop in and do a Who do you think you are? programme on me. I’d insist it was narrated by my childhood imaginary friend, Bill Paterson, the actor. I believed Mr Paterson was real, he’d been on telly so he had to be. He wouldn’t have known me from a Tunnock’s Wafer. For now, I imagine his voiceover to this scenario:

‘We follow Annie to the Public Records Office in Glasgow where we discover that she is the secret lovechild of David Bowie and Chrissie Hynde’.

Like I’d get that lucky.

Lynne's writing career got off to a precocious start when, aged eight, she was commended for a short story by head teacher, Mr Barker, a success crowned by winning threepence, less than 1p today, for spelling 'sphere'. Thereafter, it all went downhill. At nine, she sent a short story to The Evening Standard. It was rejected. At ten, she entered BBC Children's TV Write A Play competition. Got nowhere. After fifteen years, following art school, university, a trainee directors' bursary, and with a lot of stage sweeping and making tea for actors along the way, she (partially) recognised defeat and became a theatre director, directing a range of plays from Dario Fo to Shakespeare. Still unable to let go of the compulsion to write and, inspired by Mike Leigh, she produced many devised, co-written and self-penned productions. She also taught at drama schools, dramatised 3 Dickens novels for the stage, adapted classics for BBC Radio and founded a young people's creative writing company, Fable Productions. Her first novel, Terrible With Raisins, was self-published in 2013; Jigsaw Island, published 30 June 2020, is her second. Both books were inspired by the endlessly captivating Dodecanese Islands and their people.

Follow Lynne here: http://www.lynnemcvernon.com/

Twitter @lynnemcvernon

Miss Graham's Cold War Cookbook by Celia Rees BLOG TOUR @CeliaRees Guest Review @jaustenrulesok @HarperFiction @RandomTTours #MissGrahamsColdWarCookBook

Sent to Germany in the chaotic aftermath of World War II, Edith Graham is finally getting the chance to do her bit. Having taught at a girls’ school during the conflict, she leaps at the opportunity to escape an ordinary life – but Edith is not everything she seems to be.

Under the guise of her innocent cover story, Edith has been recruited to root out Nazis who are trying to escape prosecution. Secretly, she is sending coding messages back to the UK, hidden inside innocuous recipes sent to a friend – after all, who would expect notes on sauerkraut to contain the clues that would crack a criminal underground network?

But the closer she gets to the truth, the muddier the line becomes between good and evil. In a dangerous world of shifting loyalties, when the enemy wears the face of a friend, who do you trust?

Miss Graham's Cold War Cookbook by Celia Rees was published on 23 July 2020 by Harper Collins.

I'm delighted to welcome guest reviewer Louise Wykes to Random Things today, sharing her review of the book for the #RandomThingsTours Blog Tour.


You can find Louise on Twitter @jaustenrulesok

Louise's Review of Miss Graham's Cold War Cookbook

Miss Graham’s Cold War Cookbook was published by HarperCollins on 14^th May 2020.  I would like to thank the publisher for a copy of this book to review and Anne Cater for agreeing to host my review on her blog.

I have read quite a few books, both fiction and non-fiction that are set in the Second World War, but I haven’t read any that are set in the period shortly after the war, so this book which is set mainly in 1946 and briefly in 1989, caught my attention from the outset.

At the beginning of this book, we’re introduced to a woman who remains mysterious and aloof and alludes to events in her past that seem to have caught up with her in the present in 1989 in Lausanne, Switzerland and at once the reader is plunged into a mystery that won’t quite fully be revealed until the end of the book, which kept me gripped to the book trying to see if I could work out what would happen as resolution.

Then the reader is taken into Edith Graham’s life in late 1945.  She is still living at home, unmarried and working as a teacher and as she feels she didn’t get a chance to properly serve her country during the Second World War, she jumps at the chance to escape her mother’s scorn and the predictability of her life in England, to work for the British military as an Education Officer in what are the ruins of Germany.  As it turns out, her job won’t be as straightforward as she has been led to believe because she has also been asked by other government departments to supply them with information about what is truly happening in Germany.

We follow Edith on her trip to Germany and I was fascinated by the facts I found out about what Germany was like after the aftermath of the war and how everyone you met couldn’t be fully trusted as even whom you thought were allies, had their own secrets to keep.  This is not something I knew much about so found this part of the story fascinating.  I also loved the idea that Edith discovered about getting her secret information back to England past the censors, was to write to her family and friends about various recipes she discovers on her travels.  These recipes are at the start of each chapter in the book and it was quite fun as a reader to try and see if you could decipher what the code was, and I think this was a really intelligent device used throughout the novel.

I have to say I really and truly felt caught up in Edith’s life where she was trying to truly help the people she met on her travels even though resources were very scarce though Edith discovers that the British military lived in pure luxury in comparison to the dispossessed people who had been run from their own country and homes and the poverty was truly shocking to read about.

I really enjoyed this book because it was an intelligent read and yet filled with such emotional intensity that I was a wreck after finishing it as I was just blindsided and completely unprepared for what was going to happen and I know I’ll be thinking about Miss Graham and her cookbook for a long time yet.  

Celia Rees was born in Solihull, West Midlands, UK. 
She studied History and Politics at Warwick University and has a master’s degree from Birmingham University. 
She taught English in city comprehensive schools for seventeen years before beginning her writing career. 
She is the author of over twenty acclaimed books for young adults and has won various prizes both in Britain and abroad. 
Her work has been translated into twenty-eight languages. 
Celia lives in Leamington Spa, Warwickshire, with her husband.

Miss Graham’s Cold War Cookbook is her first adult novel. 

www.celiarees.com
Twitter @CeliaRees