A Call for Assistance

First one to correctly identify the book will get a Smart Bitch Title – and no, this isn’t our Lonely Heart contest for the day. I’m just trying to provide some motivation by Greed & Bribery!

Teresa Wilde writes:

Dearest Bitches:

My romance writing group got a cry for help recently, as follows:

“Hi, I have an extremely difficult question for you. I have been looking for a book that has been written by a Canadian author written about a widow who have been left a series of letters written by her late husband designed to help her face the future and carry on with her life.

I know it’s a difficult task as I do not have the name of the author or the title, but it is for my 84-year-old mother, who loved the book when she read it a number of years ago, and would love to read it again.  If you could help me I would be eternally grateful.
Sincerely
Norah”

I wonder if you could help by posting this so your gentle readers could chime in? I’ll monitor the comments to see if one of your fellow bitches has the answers.

Someone suggested that, since Norah is from England, the book might be a Harlequin Presents.

So – if you know that book, leave a comment or email me at the SBTB address! Thanks!

Comments are Closed

  1. Amy E says:

    PS I Love You by Cecelia Ahern?

  2. sinonada says:

    That’s the only one I’ve found too. The description is perfect but it’s not that old and the author doesn’t seem to be canadian. How acurate are those clues?

  3. Teresa says:

    I’ve emailed Norah with the title of PS: I Love You. We’ll see if that’s it.

    I also asked her for more information, ie, is it a historical and how long ago her mother read it.

    I’ll send the info to the Mistresses of Bitchery when I hear back.

  4. Maili says:

    I agree with Amy E.

    Cecelia Ahern is a Dublin girl, which makes her Irish, not British. 🙂

  5. I think it might be The Hatbox Letters by Beth Powning. The letters aren’t from the dead husband, though. They’re about the widow’s grandparents. But the author is Canadian.

  6. Danielle says:

    Simonada, one of the first things I learned as a librarian is that people almost never describe a book they read absolutely correctly. They’ll say it had a blue cover, when it was red. They’ll get the title, author, and date wrong (ex. the guy looking for The Satanic Nurses). It’s just the nature of memory.

    So I’d say that P.S. I love you [Feb 2004] is probably the right book. I trawled the NoveList database and the only other possibility I found was The Hatbox Letters [Mar 2005], which fulfills the Canadian requirement but the plot isn’t an exact match.

    (Also, if you’re in the mood for some snark, may I suggest reading Kirkus Review‘s take on PS I Love You? Hi-larious.)

  7. Maili’s right. As well as being one of those shockingly young, highly-successful authors who inspires equal parts awe and a sneaking conviction that my life is dribbling away to very little purpose, the extremely mediagenic Ms. Ahern is famously the daughter of Irish PM, Bertie Ahern.

    Pretty well Irish, then.

  8. fiveandfour says:

    I have no idea about the book, but I wanted to recommend a site I’ve used in the past and I swear these people have memories like a whole herd of elephants—the stuff they can identify on the flimsiest of clues astounds me.  Anyway, try the Readers Helping Readers section at The Romance Reader if these ideas don’t pan out.

  9. fiveandfour says:

    P.S. to Danielle: did you howl from laughter later on over The Satanic Nurses guy?  I don’t know if I would have been able to restrain myself from laughing right there in front of him (I’ve obviously got a lot of work to do if I’m intending to go to a good place when I die).

  10. Danielle says:

    Fiveandfour: I’ve developed a pretty decent poker face when people ask odd questions.

    But there was much chortling later on…

  11. E.D'Trix says:

    My favorite bookstore gaffe was the woman and her teenage son who requested “How to Kill a Mockingbird”. When I informed them they had the title wrong and that the book was actually To Kill a Mockingbird, the woman got extremely indignant and insisted she had the title right. The encounter eventually ended with her stomping out intending to go to Borders instead (I was at B&N).

    God bless whoever had to deal with her there… I, and the rest of the people gathered around the info booth laughed our collective asses off as soon as she left. As one customer put it: “Who the hell would want to know how to kill a mockingbird?”

  12. Amy E says:

    Okay, dying here.  Did I win a title or not?!?!?!?!

  13. Colleen says:

    I immediately thought of P.S. I Love You as well, which I read in about two big gulps and sobbed through half of and I’m not ashamed to admit it, damn it.  Good read.  Haven’t read Ahern’s other two yet, though…

    My favorite bookstore gaffe was the woman I overheard asking for “Who Gots My Cheese?”

  14. Karen says:

    “PS I Love You” had me sobbing and sniffling too…  I’ve read her other two books, also.  The letter book (I can’t remember the title) was cute, but I had problems willingly suspending disbelief because it’s told in emails that cover a time period of about 30 years (and email wasn’t in existence that long ago).

    But “If You Could See Me Now,” her newest, was lovely.  I devoured it in one sitting at a restaurant… it’s a bookshelf keeper, and I liked it even better than “PS I Love You.”

  15. Teresa says:

    Norah still hasn’t replied to my email about whether P.S. I Love You is the right book. I’ll try again.

  16. Teresa says:

    From Norah:

    Hi Teresa, Thank you for your help, but I’m afraid that all the information my mum remembers is that the husband died and left his family a number of letters expressing his love to his wife and family. It is not an historical romance and she read the book before the year 2000, so it can’t be Celelia Aherns book.
    Thanks again for everything and if she remembers anything else I’ll let you know.
    Sincerely, Norah

  17. Amy E says:

    Well, damn.  I wanted to come home from vacation and find I had a title.

    That blows.  I guess I’ll just have to go back on vacation until… um… well, until my liver rescinds its letter of resignation from THIS vacation.

    Oh, yeah.  It was a good time, I think.  What I remember was good…

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