Book Review: A Summer at Sea by Katie Fforde

"Emily is happy with her life just as it is. 

She has a career as a midwife that she loves . She enjoys living on her own as a single woman. But she’s also feels it’s time for a change and a spot of some sea air.

So when her best friend Rebecca asks whether she’d like to spend the summer cooking on a ‘puffer’ boat just off the Scottish coast, she jumps at the chance.

But she barely has time to get to grips with the galley before she finds herself with a lot on her plate.

Rebecca is heavily pregnant and is thrilled to have her friend on board doing most of the work. Then there’s Emily’s competitive and jealous kitchen assistant who thinks she should be head-cook, not Emily.

And there’s Alasdair, the handsome local doctor who Emily is desperately trying not to notice.

Because if she falls in love with him, as he appears to be falling for her, will she ever want her old life back again?"

Rating: 4/5

You can buy the book now.

I love Katie Fforde's books, so was pleased to get a review copy of her latest book A Summer at Sea on Netgalley a couple of months ago. Katie's books always focus on one particular career choice for her lead character, and in this case it was a midwife. I haven't a book centred around this profession for a long time, so was eager to dive in and find out what this particular midwife was going to get up to that would allow her to have a summer at sea as the title suggests!

As mentioned, Emily is a midwife, but is fed up with the negative attitudes surrounding her preferred method of giving birth, a home birth. She's confident in her abilities, but it seems the powers-that-be would rather women trek to hospital to have their babies, and Emily is a bit fed up of it. When her best friend Rebecca offers her a break from her job to be a cook on a puffer boat for the summer, Emily jumps at the chance of a summer on the boat in beautiful Scotland. She quickly gets into the nautical lifestyle, and makes some new friends too, including the local doctor Alasdair and his young daughter. Emily soon realises she's adapting to her new life more than she had planned, and wonders if she can ever truly go back to her old life now she's found happiness?

The book begins with Emily in her original job, and I have to admire Emily's passion for her job in midwifery. It was actually a career I consider for a while when I was younger, but then decided education was the way for me going forward. However, I loved the way Fforde writes Emily's job, advocating home birth, and her annoyance at being dictated to by the higher ups. You can see why Emily needed a break, and it was certainly something completely different. Emily does love cooking, so the job on the puffer boat sounds ideal for her.

I know nothing about boats, so was hoping the book would educate me as to what a puffer boat was and what a life on a boat like that would entail, and it certainly delivered on that for me. Fforde explains it all in excellent detail, without getting too bogged down in it, and brings the whole experience to life for me. I have to confess, it doesn't sound like my ideal sort of holiday, but I can understand how it would appeal to some people! The sights alone would be worth it. In fact, this is the second book this year I have read set in Scotland and along the Scottish coast, and both have given me the bug for Scotland, it sounds utterly beautiful and you can see why Emily was so taken with the place.

There's a little romance woven throughout the book too, between Emily and the local doc Alasdair. He's a single father, and as he and Emily get to know each other, they find that they might actually be perfect for each other. Emily, however, is certain that the puffer job is only for the summer so is wary of letting herself fall for someone, even if she is very keen on him! I also appreciated how considerate these two characters were towards Alasdair's daughter, keen to not allow her to become too attached to someone who may only have been a temporary fixture in her life, in fact the whole relationship between Alasdair and his daughter was wonderfully written.

This book was enjoyable to read from start to finish, and I liked how uncertain I was about which decision Emily was going to make even just a few pages from the end of the book - was she going to choose her head or her heart? There was quite a lot going on in the book, but I enjoyed this as it kept my interest throughout - whether it was home birthing in the dark, cooking on a boat or exploring Scottish islands, it definitely kept me interested! Fforde's writing is wonderful to read; she brings her characters to life so easily, and the way she describes her settings beautifully, Scotland certainly sounded very picturesque. A very enjoyable, fun read, perfect for packing on your holiday to relax with.

Author Article: Katie Fforde's 'A Summer at Sea' blog tour

Today I am thrilled to be hosting my stop on Katie Fforde's blog tour for her brand new book A Summer at Sea... which also happens to be my first post back in 2016, so welcome to everyone! I cannot wait to read Katie's new book, it sounds brilliant and I adore the gorgeous summery cover. Katie was kind enough to write me an article for my blog tour stop ,so please read and enjoy!

You can buy A Summer at Sea now.

"My Favourite Waterside Places by Katie Fforde

My favourite waterside place is a loch side.  If I was designing a garden for Chelsea, I’d use this lovely bit of foreshore.  There are trees, a huge selection of wild flowers – hare bells, scented valerian, orchids, blue bells – to name a few - not always out at the same time.  And a huge variety of rocks and stones.   Across the rippling water is an array of hills.  Beautiful.

Another Scottish favourite place is Crinan.  It stars, alongside a steam powered ‘Puffer’, in my latest book, A Summer at Sea.  It is in Argyl the bit on the map where Scotland splinters into islands.  The dark, peaty waters reflect the sky and mountains and across the way can be seen Jura, with its famous ‘paps’ and to the North is Scarba.   The Crinan canal joins the sea here providing locks, a harbour and pretty houses.  I’ve heard it described as the floor of heaven.

I also love Devon.  It always feels cosy in Devon, although I know it has huge, wild moorlands.   I think it’s the lanes leading to the beaches, high stone walls but covered in primroses and other wild flowers, it’s like travelling through flower-lined tunnels.   My favourite place is Dittisham.  My husband lived there as a very small boy and it’s perfect.  It has several really good pubs and restaurants, lovely walks and really good crabbing for the grandchildren.

And if only it wasn’t so far away from my family I’d have a cottage in Cornwall.  Somewhere with a good beach and some wonderful restaurants.  This applies to quite a lot of the county.   I love Lerryn, near Lostwithiel.  This is possibly because I can just remember watching the World Cup there, the year we won.  But it is beautiful, on a wide, shallow river that can be crossed with stepping stones.

One holiday, we had a very muddy walk to Mylor beach.   Rather than laugh at me slipping and sliding all the way back, my husband kindly offered to go and get the car.  I was so inspired by it’s beauty, I had to write frantic notes on a leaflet I’d picked up somewhere.  I wrote round and round the paper, the words pouring out, until he arrived.  I often wonder if I’d gone there on purpose to write I would have been quite so productive.  May be it was serendipity, I was there just at the right moment.  But it is a beautiful spot."

Thanks so much, Katie!

Book Review: A Vintage Wedding by Katie Fforde

"In a small Cotswold country town, Beth, Lindy and Rachel are looking for new beginnings.

So they set up in business, organising stylish and perfectly affordable vintage weddings.

Soon they are busy arranging other people's Big Days.

What none of them know is that their own romances lie waiting, just around the corner ..."

Rating: 5/5

You can buy A Vintage Wedding as a hardback or an eBook now!

I'm a big fan of Katie Fforde's novels, and the past few that I have read I have really enjoyed. They've been really good stories, with fab characters and an easy-going story that has kept me wanting to read on until the end. I received a copy of Katie's latest book A Vintage Wedding through NetGalley, and recently got around to reading it. I had heard good things from other bloggers, so I was really excited to finally start this one.

This book is based around a small town in the Cotswolds, and 3 inhabitants of that town. There's single mum to two young boys Lindy, a talented seamstress, but who is bogged down in the care of her own children, and her family commitments as well. There's newly single Rachel, someone who likes everything to be perfect and in its place, but is very unsure about letting anybody new into her life, let alone a new man. Finally, there's Beth, who is planning her own sister's wedding away from the controlling hands of her mother - she's unsure she can pull it off until the three new friends pull together and start their own wedding business... Vintage Weddings! But little do they know, it's more than a few wedding waiting around the corner for them...

I have read a few less positive reviews for this book, saying that the women were able to pull off their newfound skills far too easily, that everything seemed to happen too perfectly for them, and yes, while that could be true, it is a story and every story is allowed a little bit of sensationalism to make it that bit more enjoyable to read. Beth, in particular, seems to gain a cake decorating skill literally overnight which was a tad unrealistic, but again needed to happen for the pace of the novel. I liked the wedding business, the way it came together quickly and each of the women used their skills to bring something new to the business, whether it was dressmaking or perfecting the venue.

Each of the women had a different story in the book. The one I could relate to most of all was Lindy. She's a young single mum to her boys, and struggles to make ends meet, with the boys father being pretty absent from their lives. I really liked her, you could see she worked hard to be a good mum, and let her own talents fall to the wayside while she was busy being a mum. Rachel was a bit of a hard one to like at first, obsessed with her perfect house in shades of white (one called wevet, can't say I have ever heard of that haha!), and it seemed a bit off how she was desperate for no-one to come into her showhome. As the book went on and she comes out of her shell a bit more, I did warm to her but she wasn't as likeable as the others.

Beth on the other hand I couldn't work out. She's never been particularly lucky in love, her mother is a bit controlling and not all that positive towards Beth, but I struggled to understand some of Beth's decisions in the book. She put a band before her own sister's wedding, something I found a tad unforgivable personally, and I couldn't understand why the other Vintage Weddings employees let her carry on regardless of the strike for everyone else! As well as the three main women, we meet the residents of the village; Lindy's family, her boys uncle Angus, Raff and his mum, and finally singer Finn. There's a mix of characters in there, and I loved what they all added to the book - there was a real village feeling to the book and I very much enjoyed picking up the book of an evening.

There's only 2 weddings in the book that Vintage Weddings organises, and it's fun to read about what goes on behind the scenes for the three women, and what they have to do to pull off the wedding of someone's dreams as well as juggle their own love lives too! I love reading about weddings, so this was a perfect novel for me, and I did enjoy it from beginning to end. It was a lovely story, easy to read and as usual, Katie Fforde's writing is excellent and brings the book to life as you read. It's a nice escapist story that was a joy to read, and despite a couple of very minor niggles, I enjoyed all of it! Great characters, weddings, a gorgeous setting - what more could you want?! I loved it.

Book Review: Wedding Season by Katie Fforde

Sarah Stratford is a wedding planner with a difference - she doesn't actually believe in love. She is great at her job and loves organising wonderful weddings for people but that's as far as it goes - she's got no love life herself. She's got 2 friends she counts on for help at her weddings - hairdresser and make up lady Bron whose stuck in a loveless relationship, and dressmaker Elsa who likes it behind the scenes.

When Sarah manages to sign herself up for 2 very important weddings on the same day, she needs her friends more than ever and they all have to pull together to pull off the amazing weddings their clients want. They're so busy, they haven't got time to even think about their own love lives, but is love coming out from the most unlikely places?

Book Review: Wedding Season by Katie Fforde

REVIEW BY DOT

I discovered Katie Fforde's books only last year and I have enjoyed all that I have read so far. With my own wedding fast approaching, I thought I would give Wedding Season a go.

Sarah Stratford is a wedding planner with a secret, she doesn't believe in love, her skills are tested to the limit when she has to organise the celebrity wedding of the year plus her little sister's tiny budget wedding, all on the same day. Luckily she is able to enlist the help of two new friends; Elsa is a dress designer who prefers to stay out of the limelight and Bron is a hairdresser, among many things, who is embarking on a new and exciting life. So from sourcing the perfect venue, making a fairytale dress and constructing an impossible wedding cake, these three definitely have their hands full.