Summer House by Nancy Thayer is $1.99! This women's fiction is about a woman whose grandmother gifts her a lovely plot of land in Nantucket in order to fulfill the heroine's dreams of running a gardening business. However, her grandmother's generous offers causes strife amongst the family. A few readers complained that they found the shifting perspectives too confusing, as the POV jumps between three women in the same family. Others enjoyed a story which focused on the close female relationships from several generations. It has a 3.8-star rating on GR.
After years of wandering from whim to whim, thirty-year-old Charlotte Wheelwright seems to have at last found her niche. The free spirit enjoys running an organic gardening business on the island of Nantucket, thanks in large part to her spry grandmother Nona, who donated a portion of land on the family’s seaside compound to get Charlotte started. Though Charlotte’s skill with plants is bringing her success, cultivating something deeper with people–particularly her handsome neighbor Coop–might be more of a challenge.
Nona’s generosity to Charlotte, secretly her favorite grandchild, doesn’t sit well with the rest of the Wheelwright clan, however, as they worry that Charlotte may be positioning herself to inherit the entire estate. With summer upon them, everyone is making their annual pilgrimage to the homestead–some with hopes of thwarting Charlotte’s dreams, others in anticipation of Nona’s latest pronouncements at the annual family meeting, and still others with surprising news of their own. Charlotte’s mother, Helen, a Wheelwright by marriage, brings a heavy heart. She once set aside her own ambitions to fit in with the Wheelwrights, but now she must confront a betrayal that threatens both her sense of place and her sense of self.
As summer progresses, these three women–Charlotte, Nona, and Helen–come to terms with the decisions they have made. Revisiting the lives and loves that have crossed their paths and the possibilities of the roads not taken, they may just discover that what they’ve always sought was right in front of them all along.
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Dating Mr. December by Phillipa Ashley is $2.99! I suppose this would be considered chick lit, given that the content seems a bit lighter and fun, though I'm always wary of using the term. I also like to think of chick lit as a subgenre of women's fiction, but I digress. Our heroine in Dating Mr. December loses both her boyfriend and her PR job in one fell swoop, slinking off to a small town in order to lick her wounds and start anew. While there, she lands a position at the local tourist department and starts a fundraising campaign featuring a bunch of local, hunky calendar men. As you do.
After a disastrous discovery loses Emma Tremayne both her boyfriend and her high-profile PR job in London, she moves to the Lake District to recover her confidence and live a simpler life. She loves her new job with the tourist board, and she's settling into small town life just fine-until she ends up responsible for a fundraising effort that calls for twelve naked mountain rescuers…
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The French Gardener by Santa Montefiore is $1.99! If you like your women's fiction with a touch of magical realism and mysterious Frenchmen, then this is for you! A struggling marriage is helped by a whimsical garden and the Frenchman that tends it. The story jumps from the couple currently living in the cottage by the garden and a family who lived there decades earlier. Some readers had problems connecting with the characters, while others felt it was an emotional story that tapped into the difficulties of marriage. It has a 3.7-star rating on GR.
It begins as Miranda and David Claybourne move into a country house with a once-beautiful garden. But reality turns out to be very different from their dream. Soon the latent unhappiness in the family begins to come to the surface, isolating each family member in a bubble of resentment and loneliness.
Then an enigmatic Frenchman arrives on their doorstep. With the wisdom of nature, he slowly begins to heal the past and the present. But who is he? When Miranda reads about his past in a diary she finds in the cottage by the garden, the whole family learns that a garden, like love itself, can restore the human spirit, not just season after season, but generation after generation.
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Ellis Island by Kate Kerrigan is $1.99! This historical women's fiction is the first book in Kerrigan's Ellis Island trilogy, which follows the experiences of an immigrant as she decides between a life in Ireland and a life in New York during the 1920s. I will warn you not to read the summary for the second book as it's super spoilery, so tread carefully! Readers loved the lush, historical setting, though they do caution that the beginning is a bit slow going. Anyone interested?
Sweethearts since childhood, Ellie Hogan and her husband, John, are content on their farm in Ireland—until John, a soldier for the Irish Republican Army, receives an injury that leaves him unable to work. Forced to take drastic measures in order to survive, Ellie does what so many Irish women in the 1920s have done and sails across a vast ocean to New York City to work as a maid for a wealthy socialite.
Once there, Ellie is introduced to a world of opulence and sophistication, tempted by the allure of grand parties and fine clothes, money and mansions . . . and by the attentions of a charming suitor who can give her everything. Yet her heart remains with her husband back home. And now she faces the most difficult choice she will ever have to make: a new life in a new country full of hope and promise, or return to a life of cruel poverty . . . and love.
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There was a Hallmark movie (12 Men of Christmas) with a similar premise to Dating Mr. December. Incredibly cheesy, in the way of Hallmark movies and perhaps not their best, but for some reason (Kristin Chenowith) I still watched it.
I LOVE 12 Men of Christmas. It’s on our DVR.
There, I said it.
The best is still Calendar Girls with Helen Mirren.
12 Men of Christmas is actually an adaption of Phillipa Ashley’s book. (I also enjoyed it, as I do many Hallmark romance movies. They are like Mills & Boon romance novels come to life. e.g. often underdeveloped in terms of plot and character, but can easily be enjoyable if the leads have chemistry)
I remember watching 12 Men of Christmas and really enjoying it! Now, I’ll have to check out the book. Hallmark Christmas movies and cups of cocoa are my drugs of choice for de-stressing during the holi-daze.
The French Gardener is a good read. I get absolutely caught up in Santa Montefiore’s stories every time.
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I’ve seen both 12 Men (one of my favorite Lifetime Christmas movies) (it is definitely Lifetime, not Hallmark), and read the book. I recall that it’s based in England and is less cozy than the movie. There is one particular scene involving a board room that bothered me, if I recall correctly. It’s been many years since I read it.