Review - Starstruck by Jane Lovering

• 
  
• Publisher: Choc Lit (1 Sep 2011)
• Language English
• ISBN-13: 978-1906931698

The Blurb

Our memories define us - don't they?

And Skye Threppel lost most of hers in a car crash that stole the lives of her best friend and fiance.  It's left scars, inside and out, which have destroyed her career and her confidence.

Skye hopes a trip to the wide dusty landscapes of Nevada - and a TV convention offering the chance to meet the actor she idolises - will help her heal.  But she bumps into mysterious sci-fi writer jack Whitaker first. He's a handsome contradiction - cool and intense, with a wild past.

Jack has enough problems already.  He isn't looking for a woman with self-esteem issues and a crush on one of his leading actors.  Yet he's drawn to Skye.


An instant rapport soon becomes intense attraction, but Jack fears they can't have a future if Skye ever finds out about his past......


Will their memories tear them apart, or can they build new ones together?


After reading Jane Lovering's last novel Please don't stop the music, and seeing the cover and blurb for Star Struck I was looking forward to reading this latest novel.

Skye Threppal is a messed up girl.  She was involved in a car crash that no only left her shattered and grieving for the loss of her friend and fiance, who she cannot remember, but also a recluse.

She has her friend's brother Felix as an emotional crutch and her only link to her past before the accident.  More about him later.

Jack Whitaker is a writer for a popular sci-fi series and has ghosts and demons of his own to deal with.

The meeting of Skye and Jack,at the sci-fi convention seems to be a bad idea,  as they do not need the complications of each other's issues.

This is a dark romantic comedy and there are some shocks along the way.  I enjoyed the storyline and discovering the secrets these characters had.  Fast paced and action packed, just like the sci-fi series, there are some strong emotions from these characters.

There is a but!  Felix to be precise.  I was uncomfortable with his behaviour involving Skye.  I don't want to spoil the story for  you, all I can say is that I would not call someone a friend if they put me in those situations. Saying that the author portrayed these characters well enough to stir some strong emotions in me to dislike this character. Great writing.

Looking forward to more from Jane Lovering.

If you like your chick-lit to have an edge you will love this one! 

3 out of 5 stars.

Thank you to ChocLit for sending me a review copy. This did not influence my review in any way

News from author Linda Gillard

I am a fan of Linda Gillard's writing, there is no secret there.  I loved Star Gazing and Emotional Geology


Linda has, most recently, had great success with House of Silence released as a Kindle 
e-book.

From the author of Kindle bestseller, HOUSE OF SILENCE,

a 5th novel and new Kindle e-book on Amazon UK and US...

For Kindle on Amazon (£1.90/$2.99)

UNTYING THE KNOT

by Linda Gillard

A ruined castle.

A ruined marriage.

Two shattered lives.

When love is not enough, who pays the price?...

SYNOPSIS

A wife is meant to stand by her man. An army wife particularly. But Fay didn't. She walked away - from Magnus, her traumatised war hero husband and from the home he was restoring: Tullibardine Tower, a

ruined 16th century tower house on a Perthshire hillside. Now their daughter Emily is marrying someone

she shouldn't. And so is Magnus...

"Everyone makes mistakes, but I sometimes think I’ve made more than most. Marrying Magnus was one

of them. But the biggest mistake I ever made was divorcing him."

Linda's previous novel HOUSE OF SILENCE sold 12,000 copies in five months and became a Kindle bestseller.




www.lindagillard.co.uk

Found another social community!

I have just received my invite to Pinterest!


I know, I know, what with my blog, Twitter, Facebook, Blogaholic Social Network and the forums I take part in, I really didn't need another social community, BUT it is so addictive!


For those of you who do not know what Pinterest is, it is an online Pinboard, a little like Twitter and blogging in that you can follow and be followed.  I have already found a few blog friends' Pinboards.


If you have Pinterest, please let me know as I love to follow or come and find me here


http://pinterest.com/dizzyclbb/

DizzyC

Saturday Snapshot 27/8

Hosted by the lovely Alyce at At Home with Books

Some of my summer flowers are starting to go off in the garden, so I took the camera out to practice using close up feature.  

I followed this little bumble bee around for a few minutes before I got this photo.  More luck that good photography.  I love the light reflecting off his wings.

The 2nd photo is a close up of my favourite fuchsia in the garden.  You will never guess but lilac is my favourite colour and I just love this fuchsia.

DizzyC

Friday Five

Have not posted a Friday Five since.....well.......posting now.

Kates Library

These are posts that have caught my eye this week.  Please open the links in a new window so you can stay with the rest of the list :)

1.   A dear blogging friend Carol Wyer is preparing to celebrate the launch of her novel Mini Skirts and Laughter Lines, on Sept 16th.  There is a photo competition running for followers in their Mini Skirts 

 Facing 50 with humour

2.  One inspirational lady blogger I follow begins her story here Falling off a high heeled life

3. Donna at House of the Corner has the most gorgeous photo of 'mum of the week'!

4.  I used to craft a lot when I only had 2 children.  Teddyree enjoys scrapbooking as well as reading and here is some of her lovely work theeclecticreader

5. The Friday Friends is another blog I love to follow....here she has photos from her book club meeting thefridayfriends .   I do love to hear about these groups that have strong bonds that bring them together.

Have a great weekend, folks!

DizzyC

Guest Author - Ray Evans

During World War II around 3 and half million British children were evacuated away from possible air raids in the big cities in one of the largest social upheavals GB has ever seen. One of those children was Ray Evans.

Ray Evans

Photos courtesey of the author

Ray, thankyou for agreeing to be guest author here today....

When Carol agreed to review my book ‘Before the Last All Clear’ she also asked if I would write a guest post and talk about my experiences during the six years I was separated from my family, and how it affected me in later in life?

Before I get into that, I’d like to explain to you how I came to write this book in the first place - a question I’m most frequently asked. It all started many years ago, back in the early sixties when my son and daughter were children.

Rather than have me read the typical story books such as the Three Bears or Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs, they would always beg me to tell them stories from my evacuation days. Of course they were very young at the time so I stuck with the funny tales that made them laugh and see the entire experience pretty much as a big adventure.

They loved the stories so much it was always me and not my wife they insisted on putting them to bed. In fact, telling those stories so many times over is the chief reason why they’ve stuck so vividly in my memory.

Then when my wife and I retired and moved to America to live with our daughter Debbie, the evacuation stories were once again brought back to life. The reason for that was because of my then five year old granddaughter Kimberly’s insistence in my putting her to bed each night so she too could enjoy the evacuation stories. The only drawback to that was, because she enjoyed the stories so much, she never wanted them to end, she was quite content in keeping me on the side of her bed until the early hours of the morning. “Just one more granddad -  please, please granddad, just one more story.”

 Then one evening, after yet another two hour story telling marathon, when I managed to creep out of the bedroom without waking her, my daughter suggested I put the evacuation stories down on paper so they could be passed on to my grandchildren living in England, those who didn’t get to hear them first hand as Kimberly did.

“But I’m not sure I can do that,” I told her, “I’ve never done anything like that before.”

“Doesn’t matter,” she said, “you’re a story teller, and a good one at that. Just put the stories down exactly the same way you tell them to Kimberly, just like you told them to Raymond and I when we were her age. All you need is a comfortable chair, a good a pen, half-a-dozen yellow legal pads and you’re on your way. You’re retired now, she said, there’s no hurry - you’ve got all the time in the world to write your evacuation stories.”

“I will need all the time in the world,” I told her, “my hand writing is awful, and so is my spelling, it’ll take me forever.”

“Then do it on the computer, she said, “that way you won’t have to worry about your hand writing or your spelling.”
 

“Use the computer? You are joking? I wouldn’t know where to start - except to plug it in.”

“Then I’ll arrange classes at the local computer store, she said, “you’ll soon pick it up.”

As you can imagine, taking computer lessons, especially at 64 years of age, did not appeal to me in any shape or form. It was like going back to school again. In fact, truth be told, I hated school right from the very first day I started. And it wasn’t  because Mr. Dixon the headmaster and I didn’t always see eye to eye, or the fact that crabby face Miss Hartley never allowed me to be ink monitor, it was just that I did not like attending to school – period!

Fortunately I did manage to talk my wife into coming along with me. I mean, I had no alternative - she’s a very cleaver lady, my wife. I’d have been in a right pickle without her sitting alongside of me; that I’m very sure of. 

 However, now that I’ve reached the ripe old age of 78 and being [to use my granddaughter’s terminology in describing her computer talents] a ‘god’ with Microsoft Word and email, I am glad I did take my daughter’s advice on taking those computer lessons. Because had I not, I’m sure my evacuation stories would never have made it to print – that’s for sure.

Ray Evans is 4th from the left

         

The evacuation affected me in many ways. I’d been away from home since the beginning of the war, from September 3^rd 1939 up until the latter part of April 1945. Living with strangers all those years had no doubt changed me as a person, it changed my whole personality. During the early years of my evacuation, from age six until I was eight, I was convinced my mother was trying to get rid of me. That wasn’t true of course, but the fact that I was so young at the time, I was unable to comprehend what was really going on. Paradoxically, when the time came to return home, I did not want to leave Llanelli. After being bounced from billet to billet for three and a half years, then finally ending up living with the William’s for the remaining two and a half years of the war, I became so attached to my Welsh family, I begged Mrs. Williams to let me stay – to ask my mother if she’d allow me to be adopted. The fact that I was away from my mother for so long, was I’m sure, the reason why I became a stranger to my own family. It was a terrible time, and not just for me, but for many other evacuees as well.  I came back to a ravaged bombed out city, with no proper home to come back to, and with a serious inferiority complex that on occasions, still troubles me even to this day.




You can find out more about Ray Evans, watch video excerpts and buy the book here

Review - Before the Last All Clear - Ray Evans

ISBN-13: 978-1600373787
Available from Ray Evans website

The Blurb

During World War 2 around three and  a half million British children were evacuated away from possible air raids in the big cities in one of the largest social upheavals Great Britain has ever seen.  One of those children was Ray Evans.


When I was offered the chance to read and review this book by the author, I was delighted.
I enjoy history and find there is something quite magical about reading social history told by those who lived it.


Ray Evans was evacuated, along with his siblings, at the beginning of World War II from the city of Liverpool to  Wales. He was only 6 years old, in a strange town, living with strangers and separated from his family.   


Ray recalled stories of his war-time experiences to his grandchildren and his daughter suggested he put these stories into a book.  Before the Last All Clear is the result of that.


The book makes for fascinating reading, sometimes very sad, sometimes happy and sometimes shocking.  The author recalls the stories with such clarity as if they happened yesterday in past tense, sometimes as if the stories are happening in the present tense and he is re-living the events.  


The author  occasionally darts back and forth in time to recall the stories, so not always in chronological order, which reminded me very much of how grandads tell their wartime stories to children.  


A very personal  and emotional account of the author's life during the war.  It must have been very difficult for him to revisit some of those events.


I would recommend this to anyone who enjoys reading social history and memoirs.


I did enjoy reading Ray's stories.


To read more  and find out how to get this book go to Ray Evans

Brag corner - Apologies in advance

Recycled prom pic from June

Please allow me to brag just for today!

My daughter C, got her GCSE results today........

A* in Catering

A  in RE  and History (she gets her love of history from me)

B in English, English Lit, Maths, Business Studies, Science, and Triple Science

We will forget about French (D).  :)

Congratulations, C,  I am very proud of you!

Review - The Gardener by Prue Leith

• Publisher: Quercus Publishing Plc (28 April 2011)
• ISBN-13: 978-0857382993

The blurb


After a divorce and a great deal of soul-searching, Lotte has abandoned her successful career as an architect for a degree in garden history, and uprooted her three children to take a job as head gardener to millionaire Brody Keegan at Maddon Park in Oxfordshire.


Brody is as ignorant about gardens as Lotte is knowledgeable, his tastes as loud as hers are quiet.  As Lotte locks horns with her boss and his spoilt young wife, she finds herself on an emotional roller coaster.  she knows what is right for the garden, but - still raw from divorce, anxious about the children and frightened of entanglement - she is less sure of what is right for her.


Lotte is newly divorced and it still stings. She has managed to pick herself up and makes the decision to start afresh with the children, new career path, new home but she is not ready for a new man. I instantly took to Lotte as she is a strong character who knows what she wants...well for her family, anyway.

Brody, "Lord of the Manor", has more money than sense when he buys Maddon Park and has grand plans for the estate, along with his young model wife, Amber.  Brody was not easy to like with his brash ways and ideas.

By contrast, Peter, who is helping Lotte to research the history of Maddon Park, is gentle and a good friend to Lotte and the children.

I knew from reading the Prologue, giving background information on Maddon Park,  that this was going to be a novel I would really enjoy.  I wanted to know more about the history of the Park.  Once Lotte and Brody were introduced into the story at the job interview for Head Gardener I was even more excited to read on and see how this explosive working relationship was going to work.

Lotte was interested in restoring and preserving Maddon Park, whereas Brody is only interested in throwing his money into wrecklessly developing Maddon Park. Surely a recipe for disaster.

As Lotte spends more time researching the history of Maddon Park and working with Brody she discovers that not only does the Park have hidden depths, Brody does too.

A strong cast and great observations of the new feelings, hopes and fears in relationships for a divorcee and her young teen daughter.

My only reservation about this novel is that by the time I had reached page 100 I was expecting this book to be just an enjoyable read uncovering the history of the Park and it's restoration. After  a slow, but enjoyable start the author gets down to the nitty gritty of people in the story and the novel becomes much more exciting.

4.5 out of 5 for me!


Thank you to Quercus for sending me a review copy.  This did not influence my review in any way.

Sorry...it's not you.....it's me

Sorry....it's not you....it's me

I have fallen out of love with you.

When I first met you, I was about 17.  I was living at home and my parents decided it was time.
I loved it when you called me. My tummy would get butterflies with excitement.
It was all new to me.

Now,

I have a new love!



House phone, you just don't interest me anymore.
Mobile phone, he keeps me amused with internet and games.

House phone, you ring and ring, that same tone of ring every time.
Mobile phone, he sings James Morrison to me which reminds me of my darling (it's our tune, you know)

House phone, you don't even show me who is calling, you don't protect me from cold callers .
Mobile phone, he tells me, and if he doesn't I can choose to ignore it (it will usually be a cold caller)
These days, I much prefer not to have that surprise!

House phone, I dread you ringing, most of the time it is cold callers, or official calls rather than the fun friendly calls and texts I get from Mobile phone.

I don't know why I keep you!

DizzyC

It's Monday, What are you reading?

Hosted by Sheila at Book Journey

Come on over and join the fun with Sheila!  

This weekend

We had some quality family time last week.  A day at the beach, a picnic in the forest and fun at the maize maze.  

I finished

The Gardener - Prue Leith

Before the Last All Clear - Ray Evans

In  my postbox

Madame Tussaud - Michelle Moran  and  

At Sea - Laurie Graham     Thank you to Quercus


Persaude Me - Juliet Archer  Thank you to ChocLit


(Un)Like a Virgin - Lucy-Anne Holmes Thank you to Little,Brown


What I am reading now


Starstruck - Jane Lovering  and
Breakfast in Bed -Eleanor Moran


Coming up here at DizzyCLBB


On Friday my guest author will be Ray Evans


What does your reading week look like?

DizzyC

Confession time

Now, I have never made a secret of the fact that I am not a fan of books made into films.


Whenever the subject has come up on blog discussions, I always say that I prefer to perceive the book through my thoughts rather than that of the screenwriter or director.  


The one film that really turned me against book to film versions was The Girl with the Pearl Earring by Tracy Chavalier.  The film just spoilt my interpretation of the novel.


HOWEVER,  I really have to go and see One Day and The Help.  I loved these books so why do I want to change my mind.  I don't want these novels spoilt by the film version, but I have to see how the screenwriters and directors transfer these books to the screen.


I know already that I am going to have to overlook Anne Hathaway's accent in One Day, but after seeing the trailer, I want to see this film.


Everyone is raving about the film version of The Help and I just have to see if those larger than life characters have been found for this film.


DizzyC

Saturday Snapshot 19/8

Saturday Snapshot is hosted by Alyce at At Home With Books

C and AJ leading the way

On Friday we went on a family day out to a Maize Maze.


We were lucky with the weather, as it had been cooler and cloudy on Thursday. We expected Friday to be better but it was much better.


AJ had great fun and he lead the way.  It was a great way for him to practise his left and right, deciding which way to turn.  He kept saying "It is my important job to lead the way."  :)


A good time was had by all!


DizzyC

Party time over at Facing 50 with Humour

Carol Wyer, Author of Mini Skirts and Laughter Lines is having a party!


If you haven’t signed up for Carol’s on-line launch party at www.facing50withhumour.blogspot.com on the 16^th September then do so straight away. She’ll be hosting giveaways and prizes all day. 


There will even be the chance to win a Kindle. It should be a lot of fun with competitions, laughs, extracts from her hilarious novel, guests to check out, new people to meet and I even  heard on the grape vine that she will actually be appearing on a video link!

‘Mini Skirts and Laughter Lines’

Published by YouWriteOn/June 2011
ISBN 978-1-908481-81-1

Award

A lovely blog buddy Jenni Elyse  has passed on this award to me.  Thank you Jenni  :)

Please follow the link and check out her fab blog.

Seven things about me...........

1. I love Marmite.
   
2. I hate nuts.
   
3. I went off the taste of beef when I was pregnant 17 years ago with my daughter, and craved it again when pregnant 5 years ago with my youngest son.  Now I eat beef again.
   
4. I am a chocoholic!
   
5. I drink way too much tea. Very strong and half a sugar.   I average 6 -8 mugs a day.
   
6. I am fussy about said tea and would prefer to say no to tea and have a coffee when out.  Nothing worse than weak or milky tea.
7. I would love to be able to sing.

I follow over 200 wonderful blogs. I do find it difficult to give awards to just a handful.  Please see my blog list in left hand sidebar as well as...

 passing  this on to these blogs I follow........

http://bookbelle0819.blogspot.com/

http://www.burtonbookreview.com/

http://nicoleabdou-destinationunknown.blogspot.com/

http://josbookjourney.wordpress.com/ 

 

Dizzyc

Liebster Award

Now, I don't know how you feel, but I find blogging can be very rewarding but very time consuming.

The lovely Laurel-Rain Snow, writer,  has several blogs and manages her blogs so well.  I find there are days when I sit at my laptop and just don't know what to write. If this happens to Laurel-Rain, it doesn't show in her blogs.

Laurel-Rain has award me the Liebster Blog Award.   Thank you so much.

This is what Laurel-Rain said about me....

Carol's blog is fun, cozy, and a great place to hang out and see what she's reading and posting.  Check her out! She has a snazzy new blog design.

Here’s the info on this award:

1.  Rumor has it that someone in Germany, possibly someone named Liebster, created an award for new bloggers to show appreciation and thanks for their blog.

3.  Liebster means “beloved” in German and Spanish.

2.  You can only receive the award from another blogger, who has also received the award. 

3.  Awards are to be passed forward to other bloggers, 3-5 blog sites, with followers of 300 or less.

4.  Once you give the award to a fellow blogger, you are to contact the blogger and let them know.

5.  Copy and paste the award on your blog.

 

I am honoured to receive awards, but am finding it, increasling difficult to single out a few blogs to pass awards to.  I follow over 200 wonderful blogs, all deserving of awards.  Please see my blog list

I would like to pass this award on to  .........


Jera's Jamboree

Diary of a Mummy Misfit


Bippity Boppity Book

All new-ish blogs I would like to share with you.

DizzyC

Review - Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow - Claudia Carroll

• Paperback: 424 pages
• Publisher: Avon (18 Aug 2011)
• ISBN-13: 978-1847562104

The blurb


What happens when two people decide to give themselves the year off....from each other?


Annie and Dan were the perfect couple. But now the not-so-newly weds feel more like flat mates than soul mates and wonder where all the fun and fireworks went....


When Annie lands her big break in a smash-hit show that's heading for the bright lights of Broadway, she's over the moon.  Goodbye remote Irish village, hello fabulous Big Apple!  Bit with their relationship already on the rocks, how will Annie and Dan survive the distance?
They're hitting the pause button on their marriage.  One year off from each other - no strings attached - except a date to meet in twelve months at Rockefeller Centre to decide their fate.


Will they both turn up? Or is it too late for love?


After reading the blurb I was curious to see if Annie and Dan's marriage could survive a year break and different continents.


I did not warm to Annie at the beginning of the novel.  Annie was not a happy bunny. She seemed to spend her time moaning about what was wrong in her marriage and with the folks around her. She seemed self-centred and not at all supportive of her hard working husband, the local vet, Dan.  She had given up her acting dream to move to Ireland with Dan so he could run his vet business and be near his mother, but Annie did not seem to appreciate how difficult this was for Dan.  


I changed my mind about Annie and started to have empathy for her after events that happened on the night she left for the Big Apple. By then,  I was getting more insight into what was going on behind closed doors. 


The author has cleverly arranged the characters to make appearances, on cue, to give their best performances. 
Lisa was not just a childhood friend, but a much bigger threat.  "The Frenemy."
Annie's mum came into the story just enough to jolt Annie when needed. 


The story explores a long distance relationship that has already gone stale. Life is very different for Annie when she gets to The Big Apple and new friendships are established. A life far removed from home.


 Dan could not make time for Annie when she lived in the same house!
 Can Annie and Dan save their marriage after putting time and distance between them?  
 I will not spoil the ending for you.  


4 out of 5 for me!  I really enjoyed it!


I won a copy of this novel from Goodreads First reads.  

Guest Author - Claudia Carroll

Today my Guest Author is Claudia Carroll, author of Personally, I blame my Fairygodmother and more recently, Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow.  

Photos courtesy of Avon Publishing

1. In your latest novel Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow, Annie and Dan meet at Senior School, marry and should live happily ever after, but then life gets in the way. 

 When planning the novel, did the storyline about long distance relationships or the couple's delicate marriage develop first?

I think probably both storylines started to develop at around the same time. I was very interested in writing about a young couple who get together when they’re both teenagers and are madly in love, the way you only really can be at aged fifteen. You know, at that age, you’d follow the man you love to the ends of the earth with only a packet of fun sized Mars bars to live off. Whereas at forty, you could barely be arsed driving him into town on a Friday night because he wants to go out on the p*** with the lads…again.

Then I wondered, what happens if you flash forward to when this couple are suddenly aged thirty and growing apart from each other, when the cracks are starting to show in their once perfect marriage? What then?

2. On the general subject of storylines, do you plan your cast of characters and stick to them, or do they sometimes wander into the storyline ?

I would always do out a detailed synopsis of every book I sit down to write, like a kind of skeleton outline of the story. I find this really helps, and although I may meander off in slightly different plot twists and turns, once the ‘roadmap’ is in place, it’s always great to keep coming back to. So to answer your question, I’d be fairly clear at the outset as to exactly how a storyline will pan out and how a book will end. Having said that though, part of the joy of writing lies in characters coming in who take your story in a direction you could never have foreseen!

3. The two settings for the novel, Ireland and New York are so very different and very far apart, why did you choose these two places?

I wanted to pick a place that was a whole world apart, literally and figuratively for Annie, the heroine, and I thought, given that she lives in the remotest country village known to man where life is like a Samuel Beckett play (nothing ever happens...EVER) that life in Manhattan would offer the great contrast imaginable to her. So, as can only happen in the theatre world, where a single lucky phone call really can change the whole course of your life, one minute she's in the back of the beyonds, next thing, she's in the midst of somewhere as glamorous and exciting as mid-town NYC and about to opening on Broadway.

4. What are you working on now?

The book I’m working on right now is called AN ACCIDENTAL LOVE AFFAIR and it’s a romantic comedy about a newspaper editor called Eloise Elliot who uses a sperm bank to become pregnant, then gives birth a year later to a beautiful little girl, Lily. The story kick starts three years on when Lily has started play group and is starting to wonder why every other kid on her class has a Daddy and she doesn’t.

Lily grows up a gifted child, and pretty soon Eloise herself becomes initially interested and then obsessed with finding out who her baby daddy really is. If you had a child this special, is her reasoning, then wouldn’t you want to know about it? A leading cardiac surgeon, she reckons, or maybe even a conductor with the New York Philharmonic. Definitely someone highbrow, cultured and intelligent though, she assumes. Anyway, she sets about tracking him down and discovers he’s none of the above……he’s actually in prison with a police record the length of your arm.

Of course, Eloise panics and tries to circumvent fate by setting this guy on the path to middle class-dom, so that in years to come, should her daughter try to track him down, she’ll find a Dad she can be proud of and not an ex-con sleeping rough and more than likely on a Methadone program.

So, just like in My Fair Lady or Pygmalion, Eloise sets about making a gentleman of this rough diamond, just like Henry Higgins and Eliza Doolittle, except gender reversed……..

5. What book is on your bedside table? 

A big pile of books that it'll take me till Christmas to get through! Right now, I'm reading Hugo Vickers biography of Wallis, Duchess of Windsor, a character from history who I knew shamefully little about and I'm finding her life story fascinating. Also Red Queen and White Queen by Philippa Gregory. Oh and this week's OK Magazine, which I bought because a free Aero biscuit bar came with it. Delicious too. But then, I'm a total sucker for a freebie. Genius marketing......I mean, who'd ever have thought? Aero turning into a biscuit?

I would like to thank Claudia for taking time out from her writing to answers my questions.  I am honoured and delighted to share her answers with you.

I am excited for the next book already. :)

You can find out more about Claudia Carroll here

It's Monday, What are you reading?

Hosted by Sheila at Book Journey

Come on over and join the fun with Sheila!  It is the 100th edition of this meme for Sheila!

This weekend

I wanted to finish The Gardener by Prue Leith but didn't manage to.

We had a family day out yesterday, visiting my 89 year old Grandad and then on to the park, followed by chicken dinner last night.  So, it was a busy day.

In  my postbox

The Empty Nesters by Nina Bell Review copy from Little,Brown Publishers. 

Another one I am looking forward to.  Thank you Little, Brown

What I am reading now

The Gardener by Prue Leith

Coming up here at DizzyCLBB

Review of Will You Still Love me Tomorrow by Claudia Carroll

Guest author on Friday will be Claudia Carroll

What does your reading week look like?

DizzyC

Winners!

Thank you to HarperCollins/Avon Publishers for this giveaway.

Congratulations go to

Rebecca at Rebecca's Craft World

and

Laura at Knitting and Nattering

Thank you to all those who entered the UK giveaway.  Look out for future giveaways.

DizzyC