Monday 16 December 2013

From Scotland with Love- Katie Fforde *including guest post from Katie!*

 
Blurb
When Daisy travels to Scotland to confront notorious author Rory McAllan, little does she know that within hours she'll be snowed in with him. But surely she's not going to have to spend her precious New Year's Eve with him too?

Put the champagne on ice, get the fireworks ready and step into the wonderfully warm, witty and romantic world of Katie Fforde.

Review
From Scotland with Love is a delightful story.  It is a quick, one sitting read, yet manages to grab the readers attention through skilled creation of strong characters.  Mediocre publicity assistant Daisy is full of surprises, and Rory McAllen is a rugged, private author.  Polar opposites in many ways, the two find out they have more in common than they expect when they are thrust together due to a snow storm. 

I was completely charmed by this novella- not a lot happens in many ways, but that doesn't matter as it is written in a way that hooks you in. I found the characters likeable and real, the snowy Scottish landscape vividly described and Rory's cosy cottage a haven that any writer will lust after!

If you love books about writers, winter and puppies, you won't be disappointed.  I only wish it had been longer as I am desperate to learn more about the characters-follow up please, Katie?!

From Scotland with Love is out now is ebook format.

9/10

With thanks to the publisher for providing me with a review copy in return for an honest review.

Katie very kindly agreed to write an exclusive piece for Books with Bunny about how she has captured Christmas in some of her books...

'Christmas in books is so much easier than it is in real life.  You do have some measure of control.  You can make it snow, you can invent exciting relations you don't have yourself, you can have a big enough dining table (something else I struggle with), that said they can be tricky to make different from Christmases you've previously written.

In The Rose Revived, I had three protagonists and they all had to go through Christmas and all have a different kind.  May, my lead girl, went home to her parents and had to cope with the man she found quite tricky spending time in her boisterous family.  Harriet, quiet, restrained, had to endure Christmas with her incredibly stuffy grandparents.  But the girl who had to work hardest, and bless her, it was very hard, was Sally.  She was ostensibly and actress but she had fallen in love with a farmer who seemed not to reciprocate.  Somehow she finds herself organising Christmas in his very dilapidated farmhouse.  He had a lot of sisters and nieces and nephews, not to mention eccentric aunts.  She had to use a barn door as a table.  And yet that Christmas is  the one a dear friend has as her favourite literary Christmas ever.  In the book it all ended well, in real life, Sally would have had to murder someone.
In spite of my best intentions, my next book had to have Christmas in it, too.  This was very close to a real Christmas at my house one year.  It included vegetarians and neurotic women.  Luckily for the real life me, there were no heavily pregnant women present.
The most recent literary Christmas, in A French Affair, out in paperback in March, involved a diorama using every gold-foil covered chocolate animal available (and there are many.)  This was real wish full-fillment on my behalf.  One year, I'll do it.  I'll turn chocolate Father Christmases into the Three Kings and shepherds and really have fun.  Mm, may be this is the year to do it?  Or will having my 94 year old mother in law make that difficult?'

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