Christmas has arrived at Hope Island, promising snowflakes, surprises and plenty of seasonal joy. So snuggle up and fall in love at Mistletoe Cove…

Title: Christmas at Mistletoe Cove (Hope Island #3)

Author: Holly Martin

Published: September 22nd 2017 by Bookouture

Amazon | Amazon UK

Blurb: Growing up on Hope Island, Eden Lancaster always believed that if you wished hard enough for something, dreams really could come true. But Eden’s greatest wish is also her biggest secret: she has been completely in love with her childhood friend, the charming and attractive Dougie Harrison, for as long as she can remember. And he has no idea. 

When Dougie leaves his successful life in New York to return home to Hope Island for good, Eden can’t escape her feelings. Her heart is full of hope that her romantic dreams are finally, at long last, going to come true…

This Christmas could change everything. But can a lifelong friendship really turn into the perfect romance? And will Eden get the happily ever after she’s always wished for?

Review: If you have read the previous two books set in Hope Island, you know by now, who Eden and Dougie are, as they were secondary characters in those stories. If you haven't though, don't worry, Holly Martin tells their story from the beginning in this book, so it can easily be read as a stand alone. 

What I have always loved about Holly Martin's stories is the magic that surrounds them and in Christmas at Mistletoe, there's definitely a lot of magic. There's this legend that if you throw a paper with three wishes into a magic well in Mistletoe Cove, you'll get what you wished for. And obviously, our main characters try that for themselves... with really interesting results.

I really liked this magical touch, especially as it is a story set around Christmas, the most magical time of the year... I do think that September is a bit too soon to get into the Christmas spirit but the author definitely made me feel cosy and warm inside. 

The star in this story for me is Dougie, as he was so much fun! He really had the craziest ideas and he surprised me so many times! I didn't warm up to Eden that much though... but I have to admit that they made for a really interesting to read couple. 

By now, I know what I am getting with a Holly Martin book: a heartwarming romance with a good dash of craziness and this one delivered exactly that. Perfect book to pick up on a rainy weekend and enjoy with a hot chocolate and some fairy dust!

Rating: 4 stars

I would like to thank the publisher for sending me a copy of this book via NetGalley. This is my honest opinion.

Today is my stop on the Blog Tour for Holly Martin's latest story, Spring at Blueberry Bay, published by Bookouture last week. Keep reading for my review: 

Title: Spring at Blueberry Bay

Author: Holly Martin

Published: April 7th 2017 by Bookouture

Amazon | Amazon UK

Blurb: Welcome to beautiful Hope Island where the sea sparkles, the daffodils are blooming and a blossoming romance is just around the corner… 

Bella has always had a sunny outlook and caring nature, despite recently falling on hard times. When she finds a handsome homeless man on her doorstep, her kind heart tells her she must help him. So, she invites Isaac into her cottage and into her life in ways she could never have imagined… 

But Isaac is not what he seems. He’s keeping a huge secret from Bella, yet he never expected to fall for this open, generous and charming woman. 

Bella can’t ignore the chemistry between her and Isaac, but she’s had her trust badly broken in her past. Will she run when she learns the truth about Isaac, or will he be the one man who can help Bella believe in love again? 

A gorgeously romantic and heartwarming story to completely lose yourself in. Perfect for fans of Sarah Morgan, Jane Costello and Miranda Dickinson. 

Review: Holly Martin is back with another romantic story set in a beautiful island with lovely characters! Holly's stories are always full of love and magic and Spring at Blueberry Bay is no different, in fact, her stories have become a bit like comfort food for me. A happy place where I can go to disconnect from the real world. 

In this one, we meet a new set of characters with Bella and Isaac as main ones. As usual, the connection between these two is immediate and it's quite clear for us readers that they'll end up together, not so clear for them though as the obstacles they need to overcome seem too much.

I have to say this one is not on my top Holly Martin's stories (she has so many that I enjoyed a bit more), maybe because it didn't surprise me as much as previous ones but I'm really curious to find out more about the community in this little island and how the stories develop for some of the secondary characters.

One thing for sure though, she always makes me laugh several times during the story and leaves me with a huge smile on my face when I'm done reading. What else can you ask for? 

A recommended read for romance lovers that are looking for something a bit different and fun!

Rating: 4 stars

Did you miss any of the stops on the blog tour? Catch up now:

Holly Martin is back with not one but two Christmas books this year! And they are both set in a town called Christmas, how magic is this? Today I'm reviewing the second book, Christmas under a Starlit Sky, which was published last week. Have a look at what of I thought of the first one, Christmas under a Cranberry Sky, here.

Title: Christmas under a Starlit Sky (A Town Called Christmas #2)

Author: Holly Martin

Published: October 20th 2016 by Bookouture

Amazon | Amazon UK

Review: Last month I read Christmas Under a Cranberry Sky and fell in love with the setting. I would love to go to Juniper Island and stay in a glass igloo to enjoy the Northern Lights. So I was really excited to be back there with this new story. If you haven't read the first book, you can read this one anyway as it's a brand new story but I'd recommend reading both books as they are both fantastic.

Actually, I think this one is even better than the first. I loved every tiny detail of this story. It's romantic, fun, warm and really interesting. The story focuses in Neve Whitaker, who broke up with actor Oakley Rey because she thought she was not good enough for him. Oakley himself though doesn't agree and has traveled to this remote island to win her back. Their story was full of secrets, surprises and unexpected announcements and had me completely glued to its pages.

But they are not the only possible couple in the story. Gorgeous Adam has come to the island to help Neve and the last thing he wants right now is a relationship... But Juniper Island is a magic place and has many surprises in store for him. I really liked Adam as a character and enjoyed his story immensely. 

As usual, Holly Martin has created a magical story with original and interesting characters, lots of fun moments and above all, love. I really think that both Christmas under a Cranberry Sky and Christmas under a Starlit Sky are unmissable titles for this Christmas. So just treat yourself with them! 

Rating: 5 stars

I would like to thank the publishers for sending me a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.*

Holly Martin is back with not one but two Christmas books this year! And they are both set in a two called Christmas, how magic is this? Today I'm reviewing the first book, Christmas under a Cranberry Sky, which was published last week. Have a look at what of I thought of it:

Title: Christmas under a Cranberry Sky (A Town Called Christmas #1)

Author: Holly Martin

Published: September 22nd 2016 by Bookouture

Amazon | Amazon UK

Blurb: This year spend a wonderful Christmas on Juniper Island, where love can melt even the iciest of hearts… 

Piper Chesterfield lives a glamorous life travelling the world and reviewing the finest hotels. She calls nowhere home, she works alone and that’s how she likes it. For long ago Piper decided that to protect her heart she should lock it away. 

So when Piper’s next assignment brings her to the newly opened Stardust Lake Hotel for the festive season, the last person she expects to face is Gabe Whitaker, the man who broke her heart so completely she could never love again. 

But Piper isn’t the only one who has been frozen in time by heartbreak. Gabe hasn’t forgotten the golden-eyed girl who disappeared from his world without a trace. 

Now fate has reunited them on Juniper island, can the magic of Christmas heal old wounds? And can this enchanting town be the one place Piper can finally call home? 

Curl up with this gorgeously romantic tale and let the glistening snow and the roaring fires of Stardust Lake Hotel get you in the festive spirit this Christmas.

Review: Christmas under a Cranberry Sky has the perfect setting. I think I had never wished a fictional place was real so much (except for Hogwarts). Juniper island sounds just magical and I want to move there indefinitely. It's supposed to be part of the Shetland Islands and the northernmost point of the British Isles. It is also a prime location to spot the northern lights or merrie dancers, as the locals call them. And Gabe Whitaker has built an amazing winter resort with cabins, glass igloos and even a glass palace. Oh and reindeer! How cool is that?

That's how Gabe and Piper meet again. Piper is a hotel reviewer and ends up at Gabe's resort for Christmas without knowing he is the owner. Gabe and Piper go way back, they were childhood sweethearts but after a series of unfortunate events, they lost touch. This is something that annoyed me a bit at the beginning. If you love someone so much, why wouldn't you just talk with them and clear any misunderstandings? But as we get to know the characters and learn about all the circumstances, I kind of got why Piper just left and Gabe didn't try to get in touch. Plus, if they hadn't split up then, we wouldn't have this amazing story now.

I really liked the atmosphere of the island and its lively community, how everyone was ready to help each other and how nice they all were. It was great to catch up with some favourite characters from Holly's previous books too! And I found the idea to turn the village in a permanent Christmas market fascinating. The food sounded delicious and the handcrafted items so unique and magical, especially the snow balls. As you can tell, I fell a bit in love with this place.

Another highlight of the story were the many lol moments that Holly Martin added to the story. I found myself laughing out loud more than once, especially when the gang of Shetland ponies was creating mayhem. Few authors make me laugh so much as Holly. 

Once again, Holly has created a lovely and heart-warming story with her unique magical touch. No one writes modern fairy tales like her. I'm already looking forward to the next story in Juniper Island, which is going to be all about Gabe's sister. 

Rating: 4 stars

I would like to thank the publishers for sending me a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.*

Any Ghostbusters fans out there? Welcome to Chapelwick, home of the brand new and hilarious Girls Ghostbusting Agency series, where things really do go bump in the night. Here's what I thought of the first installment of this new series:

Title: Melody Bittersweet and The Girls' Ghostbusting Agency (Girls Ghostbusting Agency #1)

Author: Kitty French

Published: July 14th 2016 by Bookouture

Amazon | Amazon UK

Blurb: Life’s tough for Melody Bittersweet. 

She’s single, addicted to sugar and super heroes, her family are officially bonkers, and she sees dead people. Is it any wonder no-one’s swiping right on Tinder? 

Waking up lonely on her twenty seventh birthday, Melody finally snaps. She can’t carry on basing all of her life decisions on the advice of her magic 8 ball; things have got to change. 

Fast forward two months, and she’s now the proud proprietor of her very own ghostbusting agency - kind of like in the movies but without the dodgy white jumpsuits. She’s also flirting with her ex Leo Dark, fraternising with her enemy in alleyways, and she’s somehow ended up with a pug called Lestat. 

Life just went from dull to dynamite and it’s showing no sign of slowing up anytime soon. Melody’s been hired to clear Scarborough House of its incumbent ghosts, there’s the small matter of a murder to solve, and then there’s the two very handsome, totally inappropriate men hoping to distract her from the job… 

Review: I usually never read paranormal stories but I was a huge Ghostbusters fan as a kid and I'm really excited to see the new one so I decided to give this story a go. And I'm so glad that I did. This story is so original and so much fun! 

Basically, Melody Bittersweet comes from a family with a gift: they can all see and talk to ghosts. Tired of depending of her family's business, she decides to set up her own ghostbusting agency with her best friend, hilarious Sicilian Marina. They end up hiring awkward but super sweet Artie. And quite surprisingly, this trio makes a fantastic team. The whole story revolves around one case, a haunted old house with three brothers stuck there until the truth about the murder of one of them is discovered. I found the story of the Scarborough brothers really interesting. Each one of them was so different and with their own secrets and I think their story added the perfect emotional spark to the book.

I found the character of Melody Bittersweet fantastic. She was such a brave and determined girl but she also had a great heart and was always ready to help. I had a great time following her around, especially when a crazy pug joined the family.

There were so many crazy situations in this story that had me in stitches that I just couldn't pick one. The whole cast of characters was unbelievably good, starting with the psycho twins that are helping Leo, Melody's ex and arch-rival, and ending with Melody's grandma, always ready for a glass of bubbles. I'm already looking forward to the next installment of the series to see what all this crazy bunch is up to next!

Rating: 4 stars

I would like to thank the publishers for sending me a copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.*

                   

Chapter One

‘So, what do you do with your spare time, Melody?’
    I look my date square in his pretty brown eyes and lie to him. ‘Oh, you know. The usual.’ I shrug to convey how incredibly normal I am. ‘I read a lot . . . Go to the movies. That kind of thing.’ 

    I watch Lenny digest my words, and breathe a sigh of relief when his eyes brighten.

    ‘Which genre?’

   ‘Movies or books?’ I ask, stalling for time because, in truth, I don’t get much in the way of spare time to do either.

    ‘Movies. Action or romance? No, let me guess.’ He narrows his eyes and studies me intently. ‘You look like a sucker for a rom-com.’

    ‘Do I?’ I’m genuinely surprised. I’m five foot three and look more like Wednesday Addams than a Disney princess. Maybe Wednesday Addams is over-egging it, but you get the idea; I’m brunette and my dress sense errs on the side of edgy. I don’t think anyone has ever looked at me and thought whimsy. Maybe Lenny sees something everyone else has missed, me included. I quite like that idea, mainly because everyone who knows my family has a head full of preconceptions about me, based on the fact that my family are all crackers.

    ‘Four Weddings?’ He shrugs hopefully.

    I nod, not mentioning that the only part of that particular movie I enjoyed was the funeral.

    ‘The Holiday?’

    Again, I try to look interested and hold my tongue, because I’m sure he doesn’t want to hear that I’d rather stick needles in my eyes than ever watch an over-optimistic Kate Winslet drag some old guy around a swimming pool again.

     I’m relieved when the bill arrives and we can get out of there, because so far Lenny has turned out to be a pretty stellar guy and somehow I’ve managed to convince him that I walk on the right side of the tracks. Maybe this time, things will be different.

    Lenny pulls his dull, salesman’s saloon into the cobbled cartway beside my building and kills the engine. I don’t mind dull. In fact, my life could really use a bit of dull right now, so I shoot him my most seductive smile, cross my fingers that my mother will be in bed, and invite him in for coffee.

    Oh, just when it had all been going so well. Why couldn’t I have just given him a goodnight kiss, with maybe the smallest hint of tongue as a promise, then sent him on his way? He’d have called for a second date, I’m sure of it.

    But no. I got greedy, pulled him by the hand through the dark back door, placing my finger against my lips to signal he should be quiet as we tip-toed past my mother’s apartment and up the old wooden staircase to my place.

    He rests his hand on my waist as I turn the key, and a small thrill shoots down my back. Look at me, winning at this being-an-adult thing today! Dinner with an attractive man, sparkling conversation, and now back to mine for coffee . . . and maybe even a little fooling around. It’s not that I’m a virgin or anything, but it would be fair to call my love life patchy of late. By ‘of late’ I mean the last two years, ever since Leo Dark and I called things off. Well, by Leo and I, I mean Leo called things off, citing conflict of interests. Ha. Given that he was referring to the fact that my mad-as-a-bag-of-cats family are the only other psychics in town besides him, he was, at least in part, right. 

    But enough of Leo and my lamentable love life. Right now, all I want is for Lenny not to know anything at all about my peculiar family, to keep seeing me as a cool, regular, completely normal girl, and then to kiss me.

    ‘You remind me of Clara Oswald,’ Lenny whispers behind me at the top of the stairs. ‘All big brown eyes and clever one-liners. It’s very sexy.’

    Lord, I think he’s just brushed a kiss against the back of my neck! My door sticks sometimes so I shoulder it open, aiming for firm and graceful but, I fear, ending up looking more like a burly police SWAT guy ramming it down. Thankfully, Lenny seems to take it in his stride and follows me into my apartment. Then I flick on the table lamp only to discover that my mother is standing on my coffee table in a too-short, too-sheer, baby-blue negligee with her arms raised towards the ceiling and her head thrown back. 

    ‘Shit!’ Lenny swears down my ear, clearly startled. He isn’t to blame. My mother’s a striking woman, ballerina-tall and slender with silver hair that falls in waves well beyond her shoulder blades. It isn’t grey. It’s been pure silver since the day she was born, and right now she looks as if she’s just been freshly crucified on my coffee table.

    I sigh as I drop my bag down by the lamp. So much for me being normal. 

    ‘Err, mother?’

   Slowly, she takes several heaving breaths and opens her eyes, changing from crazy lady to almost normal human lady. She stares at us.

    ‘For God’s sake, Melody,’ she grumbles, taking her hands from above her head and planting them on her hips. ‘I almost had the connection then. He’s hiding out in the loft, I’m sure of it.’

    I risk a glance over my shoulder at Lenny, who sure isn’t kissing my neck anymore. 

    He lifts his eyebrows at me, a silent ‘what the hell?’ and then looks away when my mother beckons to him like a siren luring a fisherman onto the rocks. 

    ‘Your hand, please, young man.’

    ‘No!’ I almost yell, but Lenny is already across the room with his hand out to help her down. My mother eyes me slyly as she steps from the table, keeping a firm hold of Lenny’s hand.

    ‘Long lifeline,’ she murmurs, tracing her red talon across Lenny’s palm.

    ‘Mother,’ I warn, but my somber, cautionary tone falls on her selectively deaf ears. I expected nothing else, because she’s pulled this trick before. Admittedly, the standing-on-the-table thing is a new twist, but she’s got form in scoping out my prospective boyfriends to make sure they’ll fit in with our screwball family from the outset. Not that her romantic gauge is something to put any stock in; Leo passed her tests with flying colours and look how that ended up. I got my heart broken and he got a spot on morning TV as the resident psychic. Where’s the justice in that? 

    Look, we may as well get the clanky old skeleton out of the family closet early on here, people. It’s going to come out sooner or later, and despite my attempts to pull the wool over Lenny’s eyes, there’s never any running away from this thing for long.

    My name’s Melody Bittersweet, and I see dead people. 

   It’s not only me. I’m just the latest in a long line of Bittersweets to have the gift, or the curse, depending on how you look at it. My family has long since celebrated our weirdness; hence the well-established presence of our family business, Blithe Spirits, on Chapelwick High Street. We’ve likely been here longer than the actual chapel at the far end of the street. That’s probably why, by and large, we’re accepted by the residents of the town, in a ‘they’re a bunch of eccentrics, but they’re our bunch of eccentrics,’ kind of way. What began as a tiny, mullion-windowed, one-room shop has spread out along the entire row over the last two hundred years; we now own a run of three terraced properties haphazardly knocked into one, big, rambling place that is both business and home to not only me, but also to my mother, Silvana, and her mother, Dicey. Gran’s name isn’t actually Dicey, it’s Paradise, officially, but she’s gone by Dicey ever since she met my Grandpa Duke on her fifteenth birthday and he wrote Dicey and Duke inside a chalk heart on the back wall of the building. He may as well have written it on her own racing heart.

    ‘Silvana!’ 

     Speak of the devil. Does no one go to bed around here? 

    I open my door to find Gran on the threshold with her hand raised, poised to knock. I guess I should be glad she’s slightly more respectably dressed, if a floor-length, purple shot-silk kimono, bearing huge technicolor dragons could be considered as such. Her usually pin-curled gold hair is piled elegantly on her head and she wears a slash of fire-engine-scarlet lipstick for good measure. Most people couldn’t carry the look off, but thanks to her poise, confidence and couldn’t-care-less attitude, Grandma Dicey wears it with artful success. She glides past me without invitation and gazes at my mother and Lenny, who are still hand-in-hand on the rug. God.

    First thing tomorrow morning, I swear, I’m going to look for a new place to live, somewhere, anywhere, that is not in the same building as my mother and my gran. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a charming old place and I love my family dearly. It’s not even as if I don’t have my own space here, because, theoretically at least, I do. Mum and Gran have the ground floor apartment behind Blithe Spirits, and I have the smaller flat upstairs, at the back. In lots of ways this makes me fortunate; I get to have a nice little home of my own and stay close to my family. It would all be fine and dandy, were it not for the fact that my family are officially bonkers and liable to come up and let themselves into my flat – using the spare key I gave them for dire emergencies only – and embarrass the shit out if me. 

    ‘Why is Silvana entertaining a man half her age in your flat?’ Gran looks from me to my mother. ‘You should have said you were expecting company, darling. I’d have gone out.’ She touches her hand lightly against her hair. ‘Put a towel on the doorknob or something, isn’t that the modern way to signal these things? Don’t come a knockin’ if the caravan’s rockin’?’

    She looks spectacularly pleased with herself, and one glance at Lenny tells me that he knows he’s way out of his depth with these two and is in the process of writing me off as the worst date he’s ever had. His eyes slide from me to the door, and I can almost hear him begging me to let him go unharmed.

    ‘He’s not mum’s date, he’s mine. Or else, he was,’ I mutter, and then I’m distracted as a beer-bellied pensioner in a soup-stained shirt slowly materialises through the ceiling, his flannel trousers not quite meeting his bony ankles. Stay with me; I see dead people, remember? As do my mother and my grandmother, who also watch him descend with matching expressions of distaste.

    ‘Finally,’ my mother spits, dropping Lenny’s hand so she can round on the new arrival. ‘Two hours I’ve been chasing you around this bloody building. Your wife wants to know what you’ve done with the housekeeping she’d hidden in the green teapot. She says you better not have lost it on the horses or she’s had it with you.’

    Grandma Dicey rolls her eyes. ‘I rather think she’s had it with him anyway. He’s been dead for six weeks.’

    ‘You’re a fine one to talk, given that you still sleep with your husband twenty years after he died.’ Mother flicks her silver hair sharply. Touché. 

    Lenny whimpers and bolts for my front door, turning back to me just long enough to splutter ‘something’s come up, gotta go,’ before he hoofs it out and down the stairs two at a time.

    I listen to the outside door bang on its hinges and wonder what came up. Probably his dinner.

About the book: 

An absolutely hilarious, totally entertaining, spookily sexy read that you won't be able to put down!

Life’s tricky for Melody Bittersweet. She’s single, she's addicted to sugar and super heroes, her family are officially bonkers and ... she sees dead people. Is it any wonder no-one’s swiping right on Tinder? 

Waking up lonely on her twenty-seventh birthday, Melody finally snaps. She can’t carry on basing all of her life decisions on the advice of her magic 8 ball; things havegot to change. 

Fast forward two months, and she’s now the proud proprietor of her very own ghostbusting agency – kind of like in the movies but without the dodgy white jumpsuits. She’s also flirting with her ex Leo Dark, fraternising with her sexy enemy in alleyways, and she’s somehow ended up with a pug called Lestat. 

Life just went from dull to dynamite and it’s showing no sign of slowing up anytime soon. Melody’s been hired to clear Scarborough House of its incumbent ghosts, there’s the small matter of a murder to solve, and then there are the two very handsome, totally inappropriate men hoping to distract her from the job… 

Welcome to Chapelwick, home of the brand new and hilarious Girls Ghostbusting Agency series, where things really do go bump in the night.

The next guest on my Historical Fiction Week is Natalie Meg Evans, author of The Dress Thief, The Milliner's Secret and A Gown of Thorns. Read all about her writing, her novels and her love for vintage fashion in this interview:

Hello Natalie and welcome to Alba in Bookland. First of all could you tell us a bit about yourself?

Hi Alba, thanks for hosting me and asking juicy questions!

I’m a writer with three passions; history, clothes and being nosy about people. I stir it into the books I write which are emotional journeys, full of intrigue and with a bone-meltingly attractive man or two. 

Actually, I have to confess to a fourth passion, a love of dogs and horses and these creatures often find their way into my books as minor characters. 

Basic biog goes something like this: born in Zimbabwe (Southern Rhodesia) to parents who’d emigrated from England. We returned to England, to the east Midlands when I was very tiny. Dad died when I was six, a real life-changer. Miss him still. Educated at Loughborough High School, went to Art College, left abruptly to go to London to be an actress. Started writing. Got work in public relations, had a son, got married. Kept writing. Eventually moved from the southeast to rural Suffolk. Finally got published. Got divorced last year, now happily single with two beloved Labradors. Currently down-sizing to another house in the same village. It will be a ‘move by wheelbarrow’, no Pickford’s lorry needed.

Your latest work, A Gown of Thorns, is a novella about a girl who moves to the south of France to work as an au pair and finds there a link to the past thanks to a vintage dress. What sparkled this idea? 

Some time ago, I read a biography of the designer Mariano Fortuny, a Spanish fashion designer who worked in Paris. He created the ‘Delphos Gown’ - a classic silk tube designed worn pretty much on the naked form. These gowns mould to the body like wet tissue paper, being constructed of pleats as fine as mushroom gills. Bursting on to the fashion scene in an era when women were still heavily corseted, the Delphos helped push female fashion towards the loose silhouette that came in after the Great War. Later generations have a lot to be thankful for! I love the role that fashion plays in politics. Fashion creates shock, or responds to shock but it never stays still. Lift the hem, look under the hat, and you find people’s life stories. That’s why my books draw on a fashion motif.

I’m not a seamstress myself (too impatient, though bizarrely, I own four sewing machines) but I love to know how things are put together. Fortuny’s technique is still shrouded in mystery. It’s said you can roll a Delphos gown like a sausage, throw it into a suitcase and take it out later, and find it perfect. That, for me, is genius. Making a Fortuny gown the mysterious heart of a story was irresistible. 

Why the dress in the novel was called the ‘Gown of Thorns?’ Well, because nothing is perfect. Something as desirable as a Fortuny gown comes with a price, and the price may be the prickings of sorrow.

This novella is a time slip with strong connections between the past and the present. Why did you chose that and how did you make it work?

I’ve wanted to write a time slip novel ever since reading Barbara Erskine’s ‘Lady of Hay’ years ago. Having decided to mess with the space-time continuum, you decide what your eras are to be. For me, it was World War Two meets the recent present. Both my previous novels, The Dress Thief and The Milliner’s Secret were set in Paris in the run up to and during world war two. For A Gown of Thorns, I shifted the action to rural southwest France. What else but to set it on a wine estate, and delve into the fascinating, complex world of grapes, fermentation and bottling? My travels through France have taken me to some remote corners, and I’ve been made aware how the wartime struggles of the country are imprinted on the landscape. In a Gown of Thorns, I strove to bring the passion and danger of the Resistance alive, through the eyes of a vanished generation (Henri and Yvonne) and also through the modern eyes of my hero and heroine, Laurent and Shauna.

Your debut novel, The Dress Thief, also centers on dresses and fashion. Are you a vintage fashion enthusiast? How do you research this part of your novels?

My love of vintage fashion was sparked by my mother, who brought beautiful clothes back from Paris. She was there in the late 1940s and early 50’s, just when Paris fashion was flowering again after the restrictions of wartime occupation. She wasn’t rich, just an au-pair teaching English to the children of a wealthy family. The clothes were hand-me-downs. She also brought fashion magazines back and two decades later, she and I leafed through them. I fell in love with the super-elegant shapes of the era; the hourglass figure, the detailed tailoring. A totally different vibe to the fashions of the 70’s and 80’s. For a start, the models were older women, elegantly posed and beautifully groomed. I never believed I could be like them, but I fell for the look. My style of dressing is very informal. But in my dreams, I’m a well-to-do Parisienne in 1950, with an account at a fashion house on Rue Cambon, and I’m dropped off there by my chauffeur twice a week to be fitted for exquisite clothes. Dream on, honey.

Research begins with pictures, lots of them. Thank heavens for ‘t’internet’ which is a resource that was unimaginable when I first started writing. I read biographies of the couturiers, and I’m always in second hand bookshops, looking for those unsung gems, the memoirs and diaries of totally forgotten people who lived through the eras I write about. Professional biographers write about events and feelings. Amateur diarists write about things (how much it cost to take a taxi in 1938). So much more useful!

What made you start writing historical fiction? 

As a kid, history was my reading of choice. I can’t really explain what gives me the urge to reach back and connect with times past. I feel a rev in the stomach when I see the ruined towers of a castle, or walk through a market town with lopsided timber framed buildings. I want to know the stories they contain, and where there is no information available, I invent it myself.

You are a multi award winning and bestseller author. What did it mean for you to get so much attention on your work? And what do you think makes your books stand out?

It took me thirty years from writing my first (crazily bad) novel to being published. In that time, I kept telling myself I could make it, but self-belief grew ragged and I had so many disappointments, I often felt I’d shackled myself to a millstone. Success, when it finally came, felt like a long line of dominoes falling. Everything happened at once and in the three years since The Dress Thief came out, I have won awards, sold quite a lot of books and seen myself in the New York top 100 and all three books at once in the Amazon historical top ten.

Those moments send me back to the struggle, to the tears and failures. I want to go back to my younger self, put an arm round her and say, ‘You’ll get there, sausage.’ So, while I enjoy the success, I never take it for granted. Amazon rankings can plummet to earth from the dizzy heights, like a lump of frozen washroom waste from a jumbo jet! 

I’m an emotional person and I still have to learn to be confident and thicker skinned. 

What makes my books stand out? Well, firstly, thank you for suggesting that they do! Huge credit goes to my publishers, agent, editors and the cover designs created by their talented artists. People love my covers, which are the inspired creativity of other people. 

The stories I write are my own, however, and I tend to ‘do my own thing.’ I like to give my readers something immersive and powerful. Reading the reviews (when I’m brave enough!) suggests that it’s what brings people to my books. 

Do you think that in historical fiction, the time period and setting is as important as the story itself?

Absolutely. The period should be as much a character as the hero and heroine. A historical should, in my view, be more than a story of contemporary values with long dresses thrown in. People ‘back then’ had different values and aspirations to us. Yes, they wanted love, happiness, security, wealth, power, what you will... but how they gained what they wanted and expressed their needs sets them apart from us. Location, era, setting are crucial ingredients, characters in their own right. A historical novel should grow out of its era as an oak tree grows from its soil. 

Could you recommend us a novel that has stayed with you? 

I have read and listened to so many books in my life (I’m a big fan of audio books, particularly in the car) that singling out one is hard. This I can safely say is a novel that set me on the road to becoming the kind of writer I am; Drum roll... it’s Margaret Mitchell’s epic Gone with the Wind. You know the film, but have you read the book, folks? It has everything. Gutsy writing, a plot that treats its readers as adults (no schmaltzy concessions to sentiment). The scenes of the Battle of Atlanta are among the best heart-gripping war scenes anywhere. And Scarlett, one of the most flawed females in literature, is also one of the most memorable. 

A shorter, more contemporary book I love to recommend is Nora Ephron’s ‘Heartburn.’ Ephron was the screenwriter of ‘When Harry Met Sally’ so you’re assured of laughter and wit. This novel also hands you a roller-coaster ride of revenge and recipes.

And finally, are you working on a new project? 

I am currently writing The Wardrobe Mistress, in which my love of all things clothes-y shifts to the London theatre. It’s currently ‘in progress’ but here’s a little blurb: 

“It is 1946, the war has ended but the worst winter in two hundred years is just around the corner. Young war widow Vanessa Kingcourt has been hired as wardrobe mistress at the Farren theatre in London. Working backstage there is not just a lifelong ambition, it feels like her destiny. Not only is she looking to mend her heartbreak and rediscover the sense of purpose that her war work gave her, she needs to understand what caused her father to take his own life just as war came to an end. The Farren Theatre and its mysterious, vanished former wardrobe mistress Eva, seem to be implicated in his death. As she takes over the wardrobe room backstage, Vanessa struggles to meet the twin demands of curating costumes for a glittering production of a play by Oscar Wilde while also digging down into the past. But when she becomes romantically entangled with the Farren’s married owner – enigmatic Alistair Redenhall – her career, happiness and her very survival are put on the line.”

You can find out more about Natalie Meg Evans and her books on:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/NatalieMegEvans/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/natmegevans

Webpage: http://nataliemegevans.com/

About the book:

Title: A Gown of Thorns

Author: Natalie Meg Evans

Published: March 30th 2016 by Bookouture

Amazon | Amazon UK

Blurb: Hidden within the wardrobe’s embrace, she rifled through the folds of cloth until her fingers stopped at a gown of violet, lavender and silver-grey pleats. She lifted it off its hanger and turned towards the mirror… 

Shauna Vincent arrives in the little French village of Chemignac after accepting an offer to be an au pair to the grandchildren of an old family friend. 

As she begins to explore her new home at the ancient Chateau de Chemignac with it’s beautiful vineyards, she discovers a locked tower room where she unearths a treasure trove of exquisite vintage dresses. One gown feels unsettlingly familiar. 

When Shauna falls asleep one afternoon in a valley full of birdsong, she has a strange dream of a vintage aircraft circling threateningly overhead. So when she suddenly awakes to find charming local landowner Laurent standing over her - Shauna wonders if he might be just the person to help her untangle this unexpected message from the past. 

A Gown of Thorns draws you into a richly evocative world steeped in secrets that will mesmerize fans of Rachel Hauck’s The Wedding Dress, Kristen Hannah’s The Nightingale and Adriani Trigiani.

This week I'm celebrating Historical Fiction Week on the blog, so I thought it would be the perfect time to read and review this novel set in Kenya at the beginning of the 20th century. Have a look at my thoughts here:

Title: The Girl and the Sunbird

Author: Rebecca Stonehill

Published: June 17th 2016 by Bookouture

Amazon | Amazon UK

Blurb: A haunting, heartbreaking and unforgettable novel of a woman married to a man she can never love, and drawn to another who will capture her heart forever… 

East Africa 1903: When eighteen year old Iris Johnson is forced to choose between marrying the frightful Lord Sidcup or a faceless stranger, Jeremy Lawrence, in a far-off land, she bravely decides on the latter. 

Accompanied by her chaperone, Miss Logan, Iris soon discovers a kindred spirit who shares her thirst for knowledge. As they journey from Cambridgeshire to East Africa, Iris’s eyes are opened to a world she never knew existed beyond the comforts of her family home. 

But when Iris meets Jeremy, she realizes in a heartbeat that they will never be compatible. He is cold and cruel, spending long periods of time on hunting expeditions and leaving Iris alone. 

Determined to make the best of her new life, Iris begins to adjust to her surroundings; the windswept plains of Nairobi, and the delightful sunbirds that visit her window every day. And when she meets Kamau, a school teacher, Iris finds her calling, assisting him to teach the local children English. 

Kamau is everything Jeremy is not. He is passionate, kind and he occupies Iris’s every thought. She must make a choice, but if she follows her heart, the price she must pay will be devastating.

First of all I would like to thank the publishers for sending me a copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.*

Review: The Girl and the Sunbird tells the heart-breaking story of Iris Johnson, a girl who is sent to Africa to marry an older man. When we meet her, she is still living in Cambridge with her parents, who give her two options: stay and marry an awful Lord or travel to Africa and marry an unknown man (her mother finds an advert in a magazine). So Iris decides to leave her family and everything she knows behind hoping to find a fair man at the end of her journey. 

As she travels to Kenya, she is accompanied by a chaperone, Miss Logan. A beautiful and deep friendship grows between the two women and I was happy to discover that she remains a true friend to Iris for the whole story. But as soon as she arrives at Nairobi, Iris realises that Jeremy Lawrence, her new husband, is not a kind nor a fair man. Faced with this reality, Iris decides nevertheless to enjoy and discover her new country as much as she can and starts exploring around her new home.

I really enjoyed following Iris around Nairobi. The descriptions of this new and exotic place were generous and detailed and I could easily picture how it all must have look back then. Iris soon finds friendship in her tailor who introduces her to a local teacher, Kamau. That's when the story gets really interesting as you can feel the chemistry between them but know, at the same time, that nothing can happen between them and their future is doomed. However, I really liked the character of Kamau, he was kind and passionate and I was rooting for them since the beginning.

After this first part of the story, there are two more parts set later in time. I was a bit lost at the beginning of the second part as the jump in time is quite big and we don't really know what happened at the end of the first part. This annoyed me a bit as I just wanted to know more about Iris and Kamau. But as this part progressed and finally jumped into the third part, everything was discovered and I just couldn't stop reading to know it all. 

I was really shocked and touched with Iris' story. At the end of the novel, I felt like she was a close friend of mine and I couldn't help feeling both happy and sad by her story. Hers was not an easy life and she had to take too many tough decisions. She had many flaws and made some decisions I didn't completely agree with but all her flaws just made her all the more real to me. I'm sure this story will leave no one indifferent. A highly interesting and haunting historical novel. 

Rating: 4 stars

Read my interview with Rebecca Stonehill here

The next guest in my Historical Fiction Week is Rebecca Stonehill, Bookouture author of The Poet's Wife (September, 2104) and The Girl and the Sunbird (June, 2016). Read all about her writing, her novels and her research process in this interview and don't forget to enter the giveaway to win a book bundle from Bookouture:

1) Hello Rebecca and welcome to Alba in Bookland. First of all could you tell us a bit about yourself?

Hello Alba! Thanks so much for hosting me on your blog. I have been writing for many years but my first novel, The Poet’s Wife, was published by Bookouture in 2014. I am from London but for the last three years have been living in Nairobi with my husband and three children, aged 10,8 and 5. My husband’s job in international development working as a water and sanitation engineer brought us here. When I’m not working on my own current writing projects, I run creative writing sessions for school-aged children and also volunteer at a vocational training centre for girls doing motivational and life writing activities.

2) You have just released your second book, The Girl and the Sunbird, which is about an eighteen year old who is forced to choose between marrying the frightful Lord Sidcup or a faceless stranger, Jeremy Lawrence, in a far-off land in East Africa and chooses the second. What sparkled this idea?

My female characters are always strong women. Iris, my protagonist in this book, is left with a very unappealing choice: to marry a pompous Lord who far from supports her desire to go and study at university (this is 1903, so very few women of that day went to university), or to wed a man she knows nothing of in a far-flung British colony. Headstrong Iris also has a terrible relationship with her mother, thus opting for a new start in Africa. Living in Kenya these past few years, it made sense that I set my novel here. Many years ago I wrote a historical short story about a girl called Iris who has to watch her elder brother go off and study whilst she has to stay at home and prepare herself for marriage. Whilst not the same person, the original Iris provided inspiration for my new Iris and a story slowly built around her.

3) You are currently living in Nairobi, where your novel is set. How do your own personal experiences influence your writing?

My experience of living here in Nairobi has influenced my current novel hugely. Sitting at my desk and writing, sunbirds used to flit around outside the window and would only stay there for a short while, and if I stayed extremely still. They are the most beautiful little birds and the sunbirds in my novel became a central motif and a metaphor for the love story that develops between Iris and Kamau.

The birds aside, ever since arriving here I have been fascinated by the fact that Nairobi, this vast, teeming metropolis, is not much more than one hundred years old. When Iris arrived here in 1903 it was a tiny little township, in fact Nairobi was never intended as capital. I loved pouring over old photographs and maps of Nairobi in the early twentieth century, bleak and windswept plains over which roamed wild animals and Masaai herders, a start contrast from the Nairobi of today.

4) Each of your novels is set in a different country in a different time. How do you research your settings? 

Apart from living in Granada for eighteen months many years ago (providing the original inspiration for The Poet’s Wife) I researched a great deal of my first novel from the fantastically stocked British Library in London as I was living in the UK at that time. Here in Kenya, the historical research has proved far more of a challenge! There are a few small libraries here but they are a little chaotic so most of my research has been through books I have begged, borrowed and stolen from people or via kindle. To research the second half of The Girl and the Sunbird in the 1950’s, I have been lucky enough to talk to some fascinating people in their eighties and nineties (with astonishing memories) who have filled me in on what life was like in Nairobi during the Mau Mau Emergency.

5) Which one did you find the most difficult to recreate in your novels?

Both novels have come with their own challenges. Because the Spanish Civil War happened between 1936 and 1939, few people are still around to give me first hand accounts of what they went through, which is why reading a wide variety of books around the subject was so important. As for The Girl and the Sunbird, as Nairobi is so built up now, I had to really exercise every ounce of my imaginative powers to envisage the Nairobi of the early twentieth century, no easy task!

6) How did you feel when you held your first book in your hands?

I felt really, really proud of myself, that this was what all my hard work and perseverance was for. Ever since I was a young girl, it has been my number one dream to see my name on the front of a book so it’s a stirring, emotional feeling to finally hold that book in your hands.

7) What made you start writing historical fiction? 

It’s interesting you should ask this because I wrote a blog on this very subject not long ago. Here is the link to the blog: http://rebeccastonehill.com/the-poets-wife/read-historical-fiction/

In short though, I fell into historical fiction a little by accident! The setting of Granada came first from when I lived there, and when I started playing around with ideas for a story set in Granada, it was almost as though the novel wanted to be set in the past and I just had to follow it. As soon as I started hearing murmurs about the Spanish Civil War, which ended so long ago but remains highly taboo and deeply controversial, I knew I had a story there.

8)What do you think makes a historical fiction novel stand out?

A combination of a fascinating, well-researched historical period and setting and believable characters that jump off the page are really important. The second a reader thinks It wouldn’t have been like that, or they wouldn’t have said that, you’ve lost their trust. Belief in a writer’s created worlds must be seamless, no matter the genre.

9) Could you recommend us a novel that has stayed with you? 
A favourite historical novel of the past year has been Longbourn by Jo Baker. I wasn’t particularly drawn to it by the blurb but am so glad I gave it a chance: exquisite prose and delightful characters and plot combine to make this a wonderful and memorable read. Inspired by the Bennet’s house Longbourn from Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, Jo Baker re-imagines the intricate workings of the lives and relationships of the servants. Think Downton Abbey, with none of its clunkiness!

10) And finally, are you working on a new project? 

Yes! I grew up looking at dozens of photograph albums of my mother’s adventurous travels around the world during the 1960’s and 1970’s. I particularly loved looking at the time she spent on the island of Crete in 1967, spending a short while living in some Neolithic caves that had evolved into a kind of hippy, utopian community! Using this as the inspiration springboard, this novel will have three timeframes: Crete during WW2, 1967 and the present day. I am loving writing this! And the middle timeframe is certainly a great deal easier for me to research!

About the book:

Title: The Girl and the Sunbird

Author: Rebecca Stonehill

Published: June 17th 2016 by Bookouture

Amazon | Amazon UK

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The Next Guest in my Historical Fiction Week is Sharon Maas, Bookouture author of The Small Fortune of Dorothea Q and The Secret Life of Winnie Cox and next month she will release The Sugar Planter's Daughter. Today she joins me to talk about her books, her writing and researching process and her love for Historical Fiction. And you can win a copy of her latest, check out the giveaway at the end: 

1) Hello Sharon and welcome to Alba in Bookland. First of all could you tell us a bit about yourself?

Writing has always been my “thing”. I was an extremely shy child who avoided speaking whenever I could... but I loved reading, curling up in a corner with a magical story of adventure, losing myself tot that fictional world. A chronic introvert. I stared writing my own little stories when I was about 8, but never dreamed I could one day write something that other people might like to read. I grew up awkward, self-conscious, insecure, tongue- tied, and sometimes miserable about my lack of social success, yet with a sense of adventure which helped me to take the lid off of that poor self-image. But it wasn't until my late 40 s that I actually believed, no, knew, that I could pull stories out of myself and write them down and get them published and loved by others. My first novel was published by HarperCollins in 1999 and the rest is history, as they say. I'm still awkward in social situations, hopeless at small talk and chit-chat, hesitant to speak my mind. Fiction is my best attempt out at self-expression. If you want to know me, read my novels! It’s all there; I'm in the characters, in their lives. That’s where I best reveal myself. The “me” you might meet in real life ... well, I'm very boring. I'm that person most people ignore, as inept as ever in conversation, the wallflower at parties to this day! But it doesn’t bother me the way it did in my youth. In fact, I’m more confident than ever; it’s just that I don’t put myself forward, and that’s perfectly OK. I’m still an introvert, but I no longer see it as a disadvantage.

2) You will soon release a new book, The Sugar Planter's Daughter, the story of a woman torn between her family and the man she loves, set in Guyana in 1920. What sparkled this idea?

The story was sparked by a photograph, that of my grandmother’s wedding, which must have been around 1908... that, and later on, other delightful vintage photos of her family. She had eight boys, no girls, which is an interesting set-up I borrowed for the story. Also, she was a white woman who married a black man... and I could only imagine what a scandal that must have been at the time. So I imagined it into a story. Obviously it's not about her... her life would have been very different to my Winnie (and yes. her name was Winnie too, and her husband was George, just like in the book!) So I created this character who faced a whole litany of problems, with situations borrowed from my grandmother’s life. It’s a story about marriage, motherhood, womanhood, betrayal, bad things happening to good people. I'd describe it as bittersweet; it made me cry while writing, and if my readers cry too ill have done the job!

3) You were born in Guyana, where some of your novels are set, and have lived in several countries and lived quite an eventful life since then. How do your own personal experiences influence your writing?

My life experiences are the warp and woof of my writing. They provide the nourishment, so to speak, the roots out of which my novels have grown. The book “Becoming a Writer” by Dorothea Brande played a big part in my finding the courage to write seriously and its a quote from her that gave me the confidence to even begin. Stories, Brande says, are formed in the unconscious mind, which must “flow freely and richly, bringing at demand all the treasures of memory, all the emotions, scenes, incidents, intimations of character and relationship" which is stored away beyond our awareness. She says that we can learn to tap that rich store, and that book helped me to learn how to do that.

That's how I feel: that everything I’ve ever experienced is subconsciously put together deep inside of me, and writing is a matter of accessing that area of myself. 

4) Your novels are set in different times and places. How do you research your settings? 

My main settings are Guyana, or rather, the colony British Guiana as it was called when I was growing up there, and India. I have a deep and lasting love for India and when I go there - which is almost every year - I simply merge myself into the life I find there, lose my old self and take on a whole different persona. I write mostly from my own observations , and what I don't know, I research, I talk to people, read books, look up obscure details, and so on. Obviously research is much easier today than it was when I first started writing, I honestly don't know how I managed without Google! Sometimes I reach out and find an expert who can help me; for instance, when writing my last book, the Secret Life of Winnie cox, I needed information about telegraphy and Morse; I found an expert on the Internet, contacted him, and he answered my questions. When I write my very first published novel, I somehow found a historian who worked at the British Library and she answered my questions, and I even met her at the library once, and she showed me how to look things up. I still have my old British Library card, but I never had to use it again.

5) Which one did you find the most difficult to recreate in your novels?

It’s not so much places that I find difficult, it's times. Researching the past can be very tricky, as I don't want to make mistakes but nobody was actually there and some of the information I need can be obscure, so often no-one really knows, For instance: how long would it take to get from a to b in 1914 British Guiana? But the good news is, is that since nobody was actually there nobody is going to say I'm wrong. I do try to be as accurate as possible but sometimes if the information is simply no there I take the creative license to make an informed guess.

6) Which authors have inspired or influenced your writing?

As a child my favorite authors were A A Milne, Enid Blyton, Mary O’Hara. Later n, at school, I had to read the classics, and though I found some of them boring I adored Jane Eyre. Every term at school we took on one of Shakespeare plays and to this day I can recite some of the speeches I was forced to learn by heart. I think this learning by heart is a magnificent way to absorb the sense of rhythm and beauty into the psyche; it seems that it's not encouraged so much in today's schools and that's a pity.

Contemporary authors who made me see what kid of books I'd like to write are Rohinton Mistry and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. 

7) What made you start writing historical fiction? 

I like reading it! I love going back into the past and reliving it through reading fiction, so when it came to writing it seemed a given. In my own life, the best times were back in the fifties, sixties, seventies. Not exactly history, but those years bring back a nostalgia which feeds into the stories I create.

8) Do you think that in historical fiction, the time period and setting is as important as the story itself?

Absolutely. The background – time as well as place – are absolutely essential to the stories I tell. I couldn’t simply lift the stories out of their time and setting and place them, say, in 21st century UK. Well, I suppose I could, and some writers do adapt older novels to the present, but there is a certain atmosphere in older times that simply dissolves when you transplant it to the present. A certain sense of leisure, of timelessness, which is simply non-existent in today’s society. I doubt that I will ever write anything set later than the seventies – at the most, I might create a story thread set today, but always as a framework for a much earlier story, as I did in The Small Fortune of Dorothea Q. That book is about a modern-day girl who discovers her grandmother’s story, and grows through it. I think we have a lot to learn from those who went before us, their attitudes to life and love, and I hope that this comes through in my novels.

9) Could you recommend us a novel that has stayed with you? 

Books by the two writers I mentioned above: A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry, and Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.

10) And finally, are you working on a new project? 

Of course! I have a long line-up of projects. Next year I retire and I can’t wait to have the time to write them all down, or revise those already written!

Twitter: https://twitter.com/sharon_maas

Webpage: http://www.sharonmaas.com/

About the book:

Title: The Sugar Planter's Daughter

Author: Sharon Maas

Published: July 22nd 2016 by Bookouture

Amazon | Amazon UK

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Thanks to Bookouture, I've got an ebook bundle to giveaway to one lucky winner. The Giveaway is International and the winner will be contacted via email and will have 48h to claim their prize: 

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