Read an extract: Christmas Miracles at the Little Log Cabin by Helen J Rolfe

14 Friday Dec 2018

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Do you believe in Christmas Miracles?

We’ve a delicious extract for you to read from Helen J Rolfe’s heart-warming festive romance, Christmas Miracles at the Little Log Cabin.

Here’s what the blurb has to say about the book:

Holly is looking for a change and even though not everyone agrees with her career choices, she’s determined there’s more to this life than the long hours she works as an editor in New York City.

What she doesn’t expect is to meet Mitch, a recluse who’s hiding more than she realises.

Mitch does all he can to avoid human contact, spending his days in the little log cabin out in the woods behind Inglenook Falls where he owns a Christmas tree farm, so when Holly falls into his life, he’s not sure how to react.

All he knows is that something needs to change if he ever wants to get his life back on track. Continue reading →

Review: Anita Waller’s Murder Undeniable proves an undeniable hit

11 Tuesday Dec 2018

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What happens when the good man you married isn’t all he seems to be?

In fact, he’s much, much worse than Katerina Rowe, a church deacon in the historic plague village of Eyam, could ever imagine.

And the tension is palpable as Kat slowly realises her life is built on a lie and Leon, the husband she adores, is a crook and a scoundrel.

But is he also a murderer?

Murder Undeniable is a promising start to a new crime fiction series from prolific Sheffield-based writer Anita Waller. Continue reading →

Review: Hope and Christmas Spirit galore in Susan Buchanan’s seasonal story

10 Monday Dec 2018

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Everyone needs the right mix of Hope and Christmas Spirit and the mysterious Natalie Hope has both in abundance.

She’s a woman on a mission: every December she has just 24 days to make sure four unhappy people have a Christmas to remember.

This year she’s landed in the small town of Winstanton, twenty miles north of Glasgow, and, in next to no time, she’s working her magic: re-uniting families, bringing lovers together and generally stirring things up.

It’s all a bit clichéd but who cares? Continue reading →

Review: Staying On – feel good story about a three-quarter-life crisis by Kev King author CM Taylor

06 Thursday Dec 2018

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Hopefully CM Taylor won’t take this the wrong way, but I thought the author of Staying On must be a woman.

Partly, this was because the family-orientated thrust of the story seemed a feminine rather than a masculine theme and partly too, because in the opening pages, the authorial voice seemed to be female rather than male – don’t ask me to analyse why, that’s just the way I read it.

But the clincher was that the exploration of the inner lives of the main protagonists was…well, it’s what women writers do. Continue reading →

News: A very special People’s Friend short story debut

12 Monday Nov 2018

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Christmas came early to the Featherstone household this morning when the postman brought a very special present: The People’s Friend Christmas Special, featuring my short story A House of Prayer.

I’ve been floating on clouds ever since.

A dream come true.

Ever since I was a little girl, and used to curl up in a corner to read my grandmother’s My Weekly magazine, I’ve dreamed of becoming a writer and seeing my byline in print. Continue reading →

Review: Isa Ritchie’s Fishing with Māui is a multi-layered, multi-voiced delight

07 Wednesday Nov 2018

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Fishing for Maui - Front - (RGB) (002)Every so often you get to the end of a book and think: ‘I’d better read that again.’

Fishing with Māui, by Wellington-based author Isa Ritchie, is one such book.

I turned the last page a couple of days ago and I’m still not sure I’ve picked up on all the nuances or that I’ve properly understood what Ritchie was trying to say about the importance of family and tradition; the place of religion (or not!); and the difficulties of being comfortable in your own skin. Continue reading →

Viewpoint: the celebrity’s guide to personal columns – and first world problems – at Waitrose!

31 Wednesday Oct 2018

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There was an interesting juxtaposition of articles in a newspaper this week and, while I first thought it was a mean trick by a grudging sub editor to put the two side by side, I realized that one was a harrowing story of bravery while the other was … well… an over-indulgent whine. In other words, a poorly considered first person column. Continue reading →

Review: Inside the Whispers – another page-turner from best seller AJ Waines

21 Sunday Oct 2018

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A.J. Waines - Inside the Whispers_cover_1Losing one patient to suicide is happenstance.

When a second dies it could be coincidence…

But alarm bells start ringing VERY loudly for Dr Sam Willerby, a specialist in post traumatic stress, when suicide claims the life of a third patient.

It’s not just her professional reputation that’s at stake – all three turned to Sam for counselling after surviving a fire on the London Underground – her lover Con is also displaying similar symptoms, and Sam is terrified he too will give in to the voices in his head that tell him he doesn’t deserve to live. Continue reading →