Saturday, July 19, 2025

The Italian Vineyard by Anita Chapman


The Italian Vineyard: An absolutely breathtaking and addictive dual timeline romance


Ebook:  357 pages Kindle edition

Genre: Contemporary Fiction, Historical Fiction,

Publisher: July 2025 by Bookouture

Source: My Kindle Library via NetGalley

First Sentence: The woman pushed open the shutters and was blessed with the most breathtaking view - one she'd fallen in love with at first sight, since arriving from England only days before.

Setting: Italy

Review Quote: ‘Wow, what a story!... Amazing!... Very emotional… Heartbreaking… So very beautiful! You just can’t put it down, from the beginning till the last pages.’ NetGalley Reviewer, 

My Opinion: 

Just two years ago Anita Chapman published her first novel. In this short period of time she has established herself as an author that writes captivating stories in Italian settings and 'The Italian Vineyard' is her fourth published novel.

This latest story is a dual timeline one set in the 1930 's and the present day. The main protagonists are Kate, in the 21st century  and her great grandmother Lady Charlotte in the 1930's. In 1939  Charlotte was presented with a very special gift of fine wine and it is this vintage bottle that links these two women and their personal love stories together. The backdrop for this emotional yet uplifting novel are the wonderful settings of Italy and the Surrey Hills.

Once again Anita Chapman has transported me to places I am familiar with. She successfully shares her own love of Italy by writing stories that feel realistic. Perfect escapism for Italophiles and those readers that enjoy a satisfying story with an element of mystery.

It is with thanks to Bookouture, NetGalley and Anita Chapman that this title was made available for me to read and review.


Previous Reviews:   The Venice Secret.   The Florence Letter.  

The Tuscan Diary


Précis Courtesy of Goodreads: 

Gazing out over the lush, rolling vineyards of Verona, Kate thinks of the gift that brought her to Italy. The dusty bottle of wine from her great-grandmother’s cellar, which holds the key to a family mystery that will change everything…

England, 1939. After her husband’s unexpected death, Lady Charlotte throws herself into reviving the vineyard at his beloved home, Copeley Park – desperate to focus on anything other than the dangerous secret she now carries. Along with her head gardener, Albert, she travels to Verona for research, where she is quickly distracted by Italy’s beautiful golden light and vibrant mimosa flowers. But just as her heart starts to open up, the threat of war spreads across Europe, tearing apart Charlotte’s plans for her future and leaving her with a heart-wrenching decision to make…

Now. Devastated by the loss of her mother and newly single, Kate asks to work at Copeley Park – her family’s failing estate – to take her mind off her heartbreak. But when she learns that the park’s stunning vineyard might have to be sold, she’s determined not to let this beautiful piece of her family’s history go. And when she’s given a dusty old bottle of wine that belonged to her great-grandmother with a note attached from a mysterious ‘B’, she convinces handsome head winemaker Ben to accompany her to Verona to unravel its secrets…

But as Kate and Ben grow closer against the stunning sunsets of Italy, will Kate discover that some secrets are better left buried in the past? Or will unravelling the romantic mystery at the heart of the vineyard lead to a future Kate could only ever have dreamed of…?

Lose your heart to Italy in this beautiful, moving story of family secrets and letting those you love inspire you. Readers of Lucinda Riley and Fiona Valpy will fall hard for this enchanting, escapist and romantic page-turner.


Author Profile:         

                                                     Anita Chapman

            

                                                  Courtesy of Amazon Profile

Anita Chapman enjoyed writing stories from a young age, and won a local writing competition when she was nine years old. Encouraged by this, she typed up a series of stories about a mouse on her mum’s typewriter and sent them to Ladybird. She received a polite rejection letter, her first.

Many of Anita’s summers growing up were spent with her family driving to Italy, and she went on to study French and Italian at university. As part of her degree, Anita lived in Siena for several months where she studied and au paired, and she spent a lot of time travelling around Italy in her twenties. 

Anita likes to read journals and diaries from the past, and one of her favourite pastimes is visiting art galleries and country houses. Her first published novel, The Venice Secret is inspired by her mother taking her to see the Canalettos at The National Gallery in London as a child. 

Since 2015, Anita has worked as a social media manager, training authors on social media, and helping to promote their books. She’s run several courses in London and York, and has worked as a tutor at Richmond and Hillcroft Adult Community College.


Photographs and Biographical Information courtesy of the following sites:

Twitter Profile.  Anita Chapman - Facebook Profile.   Author - Official Website

 Goodreads - Author Profile

Wednesday, July 16, 2025

One Summer in Provence by Carol Drinkwater

 


                                            


Ebook: 407 pages                                                                                             
Genre: Contemporary Romantic Fiction
Publisher:  3 July 2025 Corvus
Source: NetGalley
First Sentences: The rain was a light summer matter, more a mist than a downpour. Somehow, though, it settled within her, burrowing to her bones. She was shivering, cold and hungry, and she was about to do the worst thing she could imagine. To give up her most precious possession.
Review Quote:  Straight into the world of vines and olives and love. Brilliant writing, memorable characters. Lived experience unfolds into a superb read. I loved it -- Miriam Margolyes

My Opinion: 

I have been aware of Carol Drinkwater more as an actress than an author. In the early years of this century I read and throughly enjoyed her autobiographies about life on her olive farm in the south of France. Despite the fact that she is also a prolific fiction author this is only the second novel of hers that I have read.

‘One Summer in Provence’ is a family saga set in France where married couple Celia and Dominic run a vineyard. Celia is planning the estates annual summer party and things don’t quite go as Celia hoped due to some hidden secrets emerging.

I read this while relaxing in the shade during the recent gorgeous summer weather and was transported to the South of France. If you are looking a gentle summer read but one with depth, then this is for you.

With thanks to NetGalley, Corvus and Carol Drinkwater for the opportunity to read and review. 


Précis Courtesy of Amazon:

Celia Grey appears to have the perfect life: married to Dominic, the man of her dreams, and living on a glorious, thriving vineyard in the south of France. To celebrate their good fortune, she decides to throw a huge party.

When she is contacted by a stranger who claims to be her long-lost son, David, the newborn she gave up at twenty and has never spoken of since, Celia impulsively invites him for the weekend of celebrations - without mentioning it to her husband.

Despite his surprise, Dominic graciously welcomes David and his unexpected companion - but secretly he harbours doubts. Is David really Celia's son? And who is the mysterious young woman travelling with him?

Only Celia can decide how far she will go to hold everything together, to keep her perfect life from unravelling...

One Summer in Provence is a story of betrayal and belonging, and of discovering love in unexpected places.


Previous Review:  An Act of Love

Author Profile:

                                             Visit Carol Drinkwater Store on Amazon


Anglo-Irish actress Carol Drinkwater is perhaps still most familiar to audiences for her award-winning portrayal of Helen Herriot in the BBC series All Creatures Great and Small. A popular and acclaimed author and film-maker as well, Carol has published nineteen books, and one Kindle Single, for both the adult and young adult markets. She is currently at work on her twenty-first title.

When she purchased a rundown property overlooking the Bay of Cannes in France, she discovered on the grounds sixty-eight, 400-year-old olive trees. Once the land was reclaimed and the olives pressed, Carol along with her French husband, Michel, became the producers of top-quality olive oil. Her series of memoirs, love stories, recounting her experiences on her farm (The Olive Farm, The Olive Season, The Olive Harvest and Return to the Olive Farm) have become international bestsellers. Carol's fascination with the olive tree extended to a seventeenth-month, solo Mediterranean journey in search of the tree's mythical secrets. The resulting travel books, The Olive Route and The Olive Tree, have inspired a five-part documentary films series entitled The Olive Route.

                                                                                      


Photographs, Trailer and Biographical Information courtesy of the following sites:

Author Amazon Profile.   Goodreads Author Profile.  

Carol Drinkwater - Author Website.     Twitter Profile



Wednesday, July 9, 2025

Five Days in Provence by Simon McCleave

                                          Five Days in Provence Book Cover


Ebook: 290 pages                                                                                             
Genre: Contemporary Psychological Thriller, Thriller
Publisher:  27 June 2025 by Storm Publishing
Source: NetGalley
First Sentences: A shadowy figure emerges from a bank of acrid smoke. It looks other worldly. Ethereal. I can't see who it is yet.
Review Quote: 
I devoured this book in one day.’ Reader Review, 

My Opinion: 

The first book I have read by this author and to be honest I am unsure what attracted me to read 'Five Days in Provence'. Possible the fact that the author lives in north Wales and the novel is set in beautiful Provence.

Five long term girl friends, now all approaching fifty have gathered together for a weekend of Birthday Celebrations. Things don't work out as planned as by the second day one of them has been murdered!

The portrayal of the women and their relationships with each other was not one I really enjoyed and from this aspect I was disappointed. The storyline did hold my interest though at times I did feel it was rather familiar to another novel I read. This happens of course and is not a criticism of the writer just muddled my brain. Anyway probably worth reading if you are an avid thriller fan. 

With thanks to NetGalley, Storm Publishing and Simon McCleave for the opportunity to read and review.


Précis Courtesy of Goodreads:

Five lifelong friends gather at a picturesque farmhouse nestled amidst the lavender fields to celebrate a birthday, but beneath the sun-drenched skies of Provence, their dream escape will end in murder.

Steph spent months planning her perfect birthday celebration. Five days in an idyllic setting with her best friends. Long lazy lunches, crisp white wine by the pool and a climb up the beautiful Mont Ventoux. She couldn’t wait. They’ve been there for each other through the good times and the bad. This was the break everyone needed.

After their first night partying, they begin their hike. But as the lavender-scented air turns acrid from local wildfires, fierce winds whip up smoke – and tensions in the group. They become separated. Hours later, when the smoke clears, one of the friends lies dead on the mountainside.

As shadows lengthen across the limestone farmhouse, Steph’s birthday transforms into a nightmare of police questions. Now there are only four friends. And the way they avoid each other’s eyes suggests one unspeakable truth – the killer might be sitting around this kitchen table.


Author Profile:
                                                      
Simon McCleave

Simon McCleave is a multi million-selling crime novelist who lives in North Wales with his wife and two children.

Before he was an author, Simon worked as a script editor at the BBC and a producer at Channel 4 before working as a story analyst in Los Angeles. He then became a script writer, writing on series such as Silent Witness, The Bill, EastEnders and many more. His Channel 4 film Out of the Game was critically acclaimed and described as ‘an unflinching portrayal of male friendship’ by Time Out.

His first book, 'The Snowdonia Killings', was released in January 2020 and soon became an Amazon Bestseller, reaching No 1 in the UK Chart and selling over 400,000 copies. His twenty subsequent novels in the DI Ruth Hunter Snowdonia Series have all been Amazon bestsellers, with most of them hitting the top of the digital charts. He has sold over 3 million books to date. 

‘The Dark Tide’, Simon’s first book in an Anglesey based crime series for publishing giant Harper Collins (Avon), was a major hit in 2022, becoming the highest selling Waterstone’s Welsh Book of the Month ever. 

This year, Simon is releasing the first in a new series of books, ‘Marshal of Snowdonia’ with several more planned for 2025. 

Simon has also written a one-off psychological thriller, Last Night at Villa Lucia, for Storm Publishing, which was a major hit, The Times describing it as ‘…well above the usual seasonal villa thriller…’ with its ‘…empathetic portrayal of lives spent in the shadow of coercion and abuse.’ 

The Snowdonia based DI Ruth Hunter books are now set to be filmed as a major new television series, with shooting to begin in North Wales in 2025.



Photographs, Trailer and Biographical Information courtesy of the following sites:

Goodreads Author Page     Amazon Author Profile.   Facebook Profile.  Twitter Profile

Wednesday, July 2, 2025

A Place in the Sun by Jo Thomas

                                                          


Ebook: 330 pages                                                                                             
Genre: Contemporary Romantic Fiction
Publisher:  June 2025 by Transworld
Source: NetGalley
First Sentences: You have arrived at your destination. Make a U-turn. Turn left. Make a U-turn. Turn right. You have arrived at your destination.
Review Quote: 
Full of warmth, humour, food and family. This cannot fail to lift your spirits. ― Katie Fforde

My Opinion: 

I was given the opportunity to read ' A Place in the Sun' and being an Italophile it appealed to me. Coincidentally during the time I was reading this novel I heard Jo Thomas interviewed on the radio. It was interesting to hear how she draws on life experiences whilst writing and she gave some examples used in this most recent novel.

A young widow, Thea and her two children travel to Italy for the school summer holidays to renovate and sell a property belonging to them, in a Tuscan village.  They quickly find themselves drawn into the community life of this small village. There is heartbreak for the family but along with that comes the heart warming way that the locals accept them. 

A gentle romantic read with realistic characters that will definitely appeal to lovers of Italy and its food.

With thanks to NetGalley, Transworld and Jo Thomas for the opportunity to read and review.


Précis Courtesy of Goodreads:

It's never too late to find where you belong...

Thea knew the holiday house her late husband Marco bought in Tuscany wasn't pristine. But when she relocates to Italy for the summer with her children, she's shocked by how much work Casa Luna needs. And she only has six weeks to fix it up ready to sell! Her only option is to ask the tight-knit Italian community for help.

In return, Thea and her children become involved in the community kitchen, working alongside handsome chef Giovanni and three very competitive nonnas. Gradually, Thea begins to open up to the people around her for the first time in a long while. But just as she's beginning to wonder whether this small Tuscan town could become a new place to call home, a surprise visitor turns everything on its head . . .


Author Profile:

                                                 Visit Jo Thomas Store on Amazon

In her own words from her Website

I’m Jo Thomas and I write romantic fiction about food and love.

I’m not a chef, a farmer or even an enthusiastic amateur foodie with fancy knives, whizzy kitchen equipment and complicated recipes. I just love plain, simple, good quality food, made with love. I love the way food connects us and brings us all around the same table.

When I visit somewhere new, I’m fascinated how the food of an area can take me by the hand and lead me into the place’s history, its culture and introduce me to its people and customs.

When I first visited Galway and sat in a small restaurant at the end terrace of a row of fisherman’s cottages, looking out of a small window, light by candlelight, the moon came out and shone silver streak across Galway bay. That night I sat there and ate a plate of oysters with shallot and red wine dressing and discovered more about the oyster beds and the oyster festivals of the area and realised I had discovered the life blood of the place, its DNA and that I had to write about it in The Oyster Catcher.

Writing my second book The Olive Branch I visited one of my favourite restaurants. It’s set in the middle of a family-owned olive grove in Puglia in southern Italy, where everything is grown on the land and cooked on a big open fire: the forno. At the end of our meal the owner, Giuseppe, brought over a bottle of homemade limoncello and sat with us. He put down the bottle and poured us drinks. He asked me what kind of books I wrote. He didn’t speak English and I didn’t speak Italian. I told him I wrote about food and love. He told me life for him was all about the food that he grew on the land, to cook in the kitchen, to put on the table, and he slapped his hand on the scrubbed wooden worn table, for the people we love and he held his hand over his heart in the middle of his chest. And that, I agreed, is what I write about, the stories I tell, from the land, to the table for the ones we love.



Photographs, Trailer and Biographical Information courtesy of the following sites:

Amazon Author Page   Instagram Profile.  Author Official Website.  Facebook Profile

Goodreads Profile

Tuesday, July 1, 2025

The Treasures: The Sevenstones Trilogy Book One by Harriet Evans


                                          

Ebook: 435 pages                                                                                             
Genre: Fiction, Family Saga, 20C Historical Fiction.
Publisher: 
 2025 by Headline Review
Source: NetGalley
First Sentences: Emma Raven sat by the window, listening for the sound of the cab. Her back ached, as it did when she sat for too long.
Review Quote: 
‘Razor sharp . . . an enjoyable family saga with some modern twists . . . quite delicious’ THE TIMES

My Opinion: 

This author has been a firm favourite since I first read one of her novels back in 2018 and discovered that she writes just the sort of family drama that I love immersing myself in.

' Treasures' is the first novel in The Sevenstones Trilogy, a multi generation family saga set around a very special house ' Sevenstones'.  Following the lives of Alice Jansen and Tom Raven, it is not always an easy story to read as there are some traumatic themes dominant in both their lives.

To start with I found the story rather slow but eventually found myself fully immersed in this beautiful novel. The ending definitely left me wanting more, so am delighted this is the first in a trilogy. Highly recommended,

With thanks to NetGalley, Penguin Books Ltd and Harriet Evans for the opportunity to read and review.


Précis Courtesy of Goodreads:

Every family’s story starts somewhere.
Alice and Tom’s begins here.


On the eve of her sixteenth birthday, Alice Jansen collects her treasures – the keepsakes, figurines and momentoes that help her make sense of her fragile family. But the next day her heart is broken, and the final treasure, a gift from her father, is lost. Two years later, Alice answers a phone call from a stranger and runs away to New York, and tries to forget her last golden summer at the orchard on the banks of the Hudson.

Tom Raven can’t understand why he keeps losing so many of the things and people that really matter to him, but he knows for certain that something important is missing from his life. One day, he remembers a forgotten letter and makes a phone call, then leaves Sevenstones, the only place that feels like home, for a strange city . . . 

An enchanting, unputdownable new novel about two people finding one another and the sweeping family story that follows, from the Sunday Times bestselling author of The Wildflowersand The Beloved Girls.

Previous Reviews: The Wildflowers.   The Beloved Girls.    The Stargazers


Author Profile:



Autobiography in the author's own words from her  Goodreads Profile

I was born in London and grew up there. I was very bookish, and had a huge imagination which used to cause me to get rather anxious at times. Now I know it's a good thing for a writer to have. I loved musicals, and playing imaginative games, and my Barbie perfume making kit. Most of all I loved reading. I read everything, but I also read lots of things over and over, which I think is so important.

At university I read Classical Studies, which is a great way of finding out that the world doesn't change much and people make the same mistakes but it's interesting to look at why. I was at Bristol, and I loved the city, making new friends, being a new person.

After university I came back to London and got a job in publishing. I loved working in publishing so much, and really felt for the first time in my life that when I spoke people understood what I was saying. Book people are good people. I became an editor after a few years, working with many bestselling novelists, and in 2009 I left to write full time.

I've written 13 novels and several short stories and one Quick Read, which is an excellent way of getting people into reading more. I've acquired a partner and two children along the way.

In 2019 we moved to Bath, out of London, and I am very happy there. We live opposite a hedgerow, and I can be boring about gardening, and there's room for my collection of jumpsuits and all our books. We have lots of books. Apart from anything else they keep the house warm.

More interesting facts from her life story can be found on her author website Meet Harriet


Photographs, Trailer and Biographical Information courtesy of the following sites.

Goodreads Profile   Harriet Evans - Official Website   Twitter Profile

Harriet Evans - Facebook