Relief Reads 11b - The Undomestic Goddess

The Undomestic Goddess by Sophie Kinsella
(Reader's Digest edition)

Charity Shop: British Heart Foundation (Newcastle upon Tyne)

Charity: Charity fighting heart and circulatory disease. The BHF funds research, education and life-saving equipment and helps heart patients

Price: £1 (actually I suppose 25p, as I got 4 books in 1)

Book Blurb: In the course of one day, Samantha Sweeting's life falls apart. One moment she's a hotshot lawyer, the next a hopeless house-keeper in this poignant, romantic comedy. //  My name is Samantha Sweeting. I am twenty-nine years old and about to be made a partner at Carter Spink, one of the biggest law firms in London. OK, there are a few drawbacks - I spend all my waking hours at work, have no home life and have never had time to learn to cook, or sew on a button. But then, who needs to be a domestic goddess?

Expectation: Didn't think about it too much, a rom-com

Reality: Brilliant, it was a rom-com but such a far-fetched one that I didn't get annoyed by it. Also it was more about Samantha escaping a ridiculously high-pressured job, than getting a man. Ultimately her reason for not going back was because she didn't want be one of those people who doesn't even have time to look out the window.

Overall Rating

It was a struggle           2        3        4        5        6        7        8       9      Gripping page  

to make it                                                                                                        turner

It was hilariously, wonderfully bizarre.

Twist Scale:

Knew the beginning,                                                                                 As twisty as the 

middle and end         2       3        4         5       6        7        8        9      bendy wendy road

from the first line 

There was a bit in the middle I really wasn't expecting, but it would have been a very short story without it!

Tear-jerker Scale:

 As dry as a house       2        3       4         5         6         7       8        9     Cried an ocean

 throughout

Do tears of laughter count? I give it a 3 because I did feel for her as her idol is taken away from her and suddenly her life has no meaning.

Moral of the Story: The good life is the best life

***

Coming up: 2 more books to come in this series...

No update, as I wrote the last blog about 5 mins ago

Relief Reads 11a - Nights of Rain and Stars

Nights of Rain and Stars by Maeve Binchy
(Reader's Digest edition)

Charity Shop: British Heart Foundation (Newcastle upon Tyne)

Charity: Charity fighting heart and circulatory disease. The BHF funds research, education and life-saving equipment and helps heart patients

Price: £1

Book Blurb: A memorable tapestry of human emotions played out in an idyllic Greek village, in which four tourists meet by chance and discover that each has a personal crisis to solve. // In a greek taverna high in the hills above the little village of Aghia Anna, four strangers meet: Fiona, a young Irish nurse; Thomas, a Californian academic; Elsa, a glamorous German television presenter; and David, a shy young English boy. Drawn together by the horror of a tragedy that unfolds in front of their eyes, their dependence upon one another grows - with surprising results.

Expectation: Didn't think about it too much, thought it was a romance, and thought the entire story would be set in the timeframe of one night.

Reality: The first night was over in a couple of pages which surprised me a little. The core of a story wasn't a romance which was refreshing, and the personal crises were fairly mundane in the grand scheme of the world but to each individual appeared an insurmountable obstacle. The 4 characters became a part of this little village and there were 2 other main characters from the village itself. It was a very satisfying book in that each 'crisis' was neatly wrapped up by the end, it was less satisfying in that the two female character's crises were men-related, ptsch! With the 6 main characters (3 men, 3 women) all being single, unsurprisingly there was some romance, but that was a side-note, and they didn't all pair up which made it slightly less predictable.

Overall Rating

It was a struggle           2        3        4        5        6        7        8       9      Gripping page  

to make it                                                                                                        turner

I really liked the story, It would have been a lot better as the unabridged version.

Twist Scale:

Knew the beginning,                                                                                 As twisty as the 

middle and end         2       3        4         5       6        7        8        9      bendy wendy road

from the first line 

The reader is kept guessing about the characters' pasts which are not entirely predictable, but as I said they all had fairly believable life histories, nothing too shocking.

Tear-jerker Scale:

 As dry as a house       2        3       4         5         6         7       8        9     Cried an ocean

 throughout

Had I read the unabridged version I'm sure I'd have tears running down my face in parts, but as it were abridged and so moved on so fast I only made it to a bit sniffly.

Moral of the Story: It leaves you questioning the meaning of life, this book's answer is family.

***

Coming up: 3 more books to come in this series...

I went to visit Holy Island yesterday, even though it was just a day trip, being by the sea really makes you feel like you're on holiday. Holy Island is where the Lindisfarne gospels were written; the priory is now a ruin and the stones have been weathered into beautiful shapes by the constant wind. The island gets cut-off by the tide for about 3 hours, and being a small place, you keep bumping into the same groups of people. Worth a visit if you're ever this far North.

Relief Read 10 - Found Wanting

Found Wanting by Robert Goddard

Charity Shop: Shelter, Newcastle upon Tyne (P.S. upon entering I realised this was the charity shop I got the Princess diaries from, so as I failed to credit it last time, I bought another book from there)

Charity: Shelter is a charity that works to alleviate the distress caused by homelessness and bad housing.

Price: £1

Book Blurb: 'The car jolts to a halt at the pavement's edge, the driver waving through the windscreen to attract Richard's attention. He starts with astonishment. The driver is Gemma, his ex-wife. // He has not seen or spoken to her for several years. They have, she memorably assured him, nothing to say to each other. But something has changed her mind - something urgent...' // Immediately Richard is catapulted into a breathless race against time that takes him from London, across northern Europe and into the heart of a mystery that reaches back into history - the fate of Anastasia, the last of the Romanovs. From that moment, Richard's life will be changed for ever in ways he could never have imagined...

Expectation: A light-hearted thriller. Probably involving bad guys and deaths

Reality: A light-hearted thriller! I liked this book from the start as the characters lived in Guildford and studied at Cambridge. However that was a side note, and as promised in the blurb the story was set all over Europe. The chase begins almost immediately, but starts off quite gently as a man helping an old friend. Richard slowly gets more and more involved to lead to extreme actions that would have been unimaginable at the beginning. His motivation is not always clear, both to the reader and to himself, but clarity is achieved by the end.
Also I love the clever title.

Overall Rating

It was a struggle           2        3        4        5        6        7        8       9      Gripping page  

to make it                                                                                                        turner

I did like the book, but it's just so far-fetched that I knocked off a couple of marks.

Twist Scale:

Knew the beginning,                                                                                 As twisty as the 

middle and end         2       3        4         5       6        7        8        9      bendy wendy road

from the first line 

Nothing was particularly shocking but there were a lot of twists and turns. The core of the mystery is not terrible, but a perfect example of the frog in boiling water analogy, as a small lie turned into something so terrible.

Tear-jerker Scale:

 As dry as a house       2        3       4         5         6         7       8        9     Cried an ocean

 throughout

Not a tear-jerker but main characters did die, which was sad.

Moral of the Story: I'm not really sure. Money does strange things to people...

***

Coming up: Readers digest compilation of 4 books. First up Nights of Rain and Stars.