Blog Tour eBook Review: P.S. Olive You by Lizzie Allen

"Sun, sea . . . and a summer of endless possibilities .

From the glossy streets of Chelsea to a tiny Greek hideaway, Faith Cotton is about to have a summer that she will never forget!

Young bored housewife, Faith Cotton, escapes her stifling Chelsea life when her husband suggests they decamp to a tiny island in the Greek Cyclades for the summer. He works for the foreign office and has the inside scoop on ‘the Greek situation’. Europe is pouring money into Greece and, far from going down the plughole, Andrew believes that the island of Iraklia will soon see a tourist boom.

As Andrew flies back and forth between Greece and Brussels, he leaves Faith in charge of finding them a permanent holiday home on the island. But things don’t go to plan – over the course of a summer, Faith’s doomed marriage begins to unravel, and far from finding a house she set out for, she finally discovers the person she really is. . ."

Rating: 2.5/5

Available to buy now.

Another blog tour I am part of this week is that of debut author Lizzie Allen, whose first book with publishers Avon is out now, and is called P.S. Olive You. I really liked the cover, being set on a beautiful Greek island sounded fabulous, so I eagerly began reading it on my Kindle. Although I enjoyed the beginning of the story, I soon found myself getting bogged down in the politics within the story, especially focussed on the Greek economy. By the end, I had pretty much tuned all of that out, and struggled to fathom how or why Faith had gotten so wrapped up in it. What had started so well tailed off for me, which was such a shame.

The main character is Faith, married to husband Andrew, although their marriage is far from happy at the moment. The pair have struggled to have children together, Faith isn't exactly keen on buying a holiday home on the island of Iraklia, and she isn't sure she actually wants to be married to Andrew at all. When she starts befriending a few of the locals, it opens Faith's eyes to a world she hasn't seen before, and that she doesn't have to be the Stepford wife she has to be at home in London. But is Faith's Greek love affair all set to end in tears?

If this book had stuck to the story of Faith and her relationship with Andrew, and her subsequent friendships with the Iraklia residents, I feel I would have enjoyed it more. However, it kept getting entangled with the other part of this story, which was the survival of the Greek island Iraklia despite the terrible economic times in Greece. I know this is something that is really happening at the moment, I watch the news and understand how awful it is for the people of Greece at the moment. However, when I read a book, I like to escape the real world and read something a bit light-hearted, and this is what this book cover had lead me to believe I would be getting.

Although, as I said, I watch the news, I found this was hard going to read. Allen tries to get too heavy in parts with the political message of this story, especially in the last part of the book where there are protests and all sorts going on - I honestly lost the plot and totally lost what it was all in aid of, and found myself skipping through these parts. It definitely took a big turn for the remainder of the book and it just wasn't as enjoyable for me which was a shame. Faith as a character was fun to read about, I liked her trying to break out of her Stepford wife mould and find out who she really was. Her relationship with her husband was definitely strange, and I was surprised she put up with his domineering ways as long as she did!

Allen's descriptions of the Greek island of Iraklia were nice to read, I could really picture it in my mind - especially when Faith and her new friends were all together, having fun. The political side of the book of course was sad because it is so deeply rooted in reality, and I felt sorry for the Greek people who were suffering as a result of the poor economy, but the book is keen to show that the corruption runs deep, and how the Greek people are sometimes complicit in the downturn. My problem with this book was that it didn't seem to know what it was - from the cover, it was a fun holiday romance read, but inside this was confused and muddled with the political agenda, not something I had expected at all. A good read, but perhaps not for me.