#Review By Lou of Great Big Beautiful Life by Emily Henry @PenguinRandom #GreatBigBeautifulLife

Great Big Beautiful Life
By Emily Henry

Review by Louise Cannon

There are times when life can be absolutely big and beautiful and there are big characters stories to uncover in this delightful book, which is the latest by Emily Henry.

Blurb

When Margaret Ives, the famously reclusive heiress, invites eternal optimist Alice Scott to the balmy Little Crescent Island, Alice knows this is it: her big break. And even more rare: a chance to impress her family with a Serious Publication.

The catch? Pulitzer-prize winning human thundercloud, Hayden Anderson, is sure of the same thing.

The proposal? A one-month trial period to unearth the truth behind one of the most scandalous families of the 20th Century, after which she’ll choose who’ll tell her story.

The problem? Margaret is only giving each of them tantalising pieces. Pieces they can’t put together because of an ironclad NDA and an inconvenient yearning pulsing between them every time they’re in the same room.

And it’s becoming abundantly clear that their story – just like the tale Margaret’s spinning – could be a mystery, tragedy, or love ballad … depending on who’s telling it.

Review

Margaret Ives has had quite the life, so it may seem. Much has been lived in the spotlight, now, journalist, Alice Scott wants to write a biography documenting her life. It just might be the piece of work her parents are proud of or at least see that her choice of career is a serious one and she can do the serious side of it. It isn’t going to be easy because of NDAs and there’s competition in Hayden Anderson to contend with as well. Margaret Ives gives both, rather juicy information. What is being spun out is rather intriguing and keeps you hooked into Margaret’s story.

Amongst the investigative journalism, there is romance in the air, but Alice and Hayden, it seems, aren’t always sure how to be around each other. He is tantalisingly curious about her. Masterfully, the tension between both Alice and Hayden is palpable.

There’s lots for readers to discover and lots that the characters have to discover throughout this engaging book.

Great Big Beautiful Life, with its intrigue that draws you in, the humour that makes you smile and laugh, the romance and characters with big lives to lead, could well be Emily Henry’s best book to date!

#Review By Lou of That Time Everything Was On Fire by Kerry Downes #KerryDownes @HQstories #summer #debutauthor

Everything Was On Fire
By Kerry Downes

Review by Louise Cannon

Looking for a debut novel this summer to read? Everything On Fire provides well-written characters in their thirties trying to navigate this next stage of life and friendships. Discover the blurb and my full review below.

Blurb

Sam and Daisy have been best friends since university. Back then Daisy was a wild, Fleetwood Mac-obsessed girl descended from the Yorkshire Moors, while Sam’s youth was misspent traipsing around Liverpool on shopping trips and nights out.

But as they lean against each other on a wooden bench in the tired garden of their beloved local pub, gazing out at Sam’s wedding, they have no idea that their paths are about to truly diverge for the first time.

As Sam’s desire to become a mother consumes her, and Daisy’s inability to resist temptation haunts her, these best of friends will lose sight of themselves – and each other. With each misstep and unintentional betrayal the gulf widens. But can they build a bridge, or will they let it burn?

Review

Everything Was On Fire is a bit of a slow-burn to begin with, but stick with it. It then hooks you in good and proper and a plot that just gets better and better the deeper you dive into the characters lives.

Sam and Daisy were best friends. Daisy was obsessed with Fleetwood-Mac and the book has some music vibes, which goes well with the story and summer.

Lives don’t always have the youthful carefree summer feel. Friendships change and so does the way they connect and relate to each other as they age. Sam and Daisy lose sight of themselves as desires consume them and those once strong bridges that created a pathway to each other, weaken. There are also other challenges that life has presented, such as needing to go through rounds of IVF to try to conceive.

It’s a book that nonetheless carries summer vibes within it and the relationships become absorbing to read about. There’s warmth and wit as well as big challenges in life to face.

That Time Everything Was On Fire is a good, solid debut and I look forward to seeing more from its author, Kerry Downes.

#Review by Lou of Happy Is The One by Katie Allen #MeetRobin @KTAllenWriting @OrendaBooks #HalleysComet #HappyIsTheOne

Happy Is The One
By Katie Allen

Review by Louise Cannon

Happy is the One is great for those who enjoy reading Rachel Joyce’s books. I also thought her debut, Everything Happens For A Reason to be a great read. Both are excellent for book clubs and for reading outwith them too. Today I am on the blog tour with a review. See below for more details about this book and my opinions on it as well as a bit about the author.

Blurb

hat if halfway through your life was just the beginning?

Robin Edmund Blake is halfway through his life.

Born in 1986, when Halley’s Comet crossed the sky, he is destined to go out with it, when it returns in 2061. Until that day, he can’t die. He has proof.

With his future mapped out in minute detail, a lucrative but increasingly dull job in the City of London, and Gemma to share his life with, Robin has a plan to be remembered forever.

But when Robin’s sick father has one accident too many, the plan starts to unravel. Robin must return home to the tiny seaside town of Eastgate, learn to care for the man who never really cared for him, and face the childhood ghosts he fled decades ago.

Desperate to get his life back on schedule, he connects with fellow outsider Astrid. Brutally direct, sharp-witted and a professor at a nearby university, she’s unlike anyone he’s ever met. But Astrid is hiding something and someone from Robin.

And he’s hiding even more from her…

For fans of Hazel Prior, Rachel Joyce and Jonas Jonasson

Review

Katie Allen poses a question that I am sure I am not the only other person who has thought of: What would you do if you knew the exact moment you were going to die and how would you then proceed to live your life? Deep and thought provoking for readers to ponder and for her main characters to navigate.

Robin whole-heartedly believes he knows when he’s going to die. It’s all linked to a theory he’s been told since he was a child to do with Halley’s Comet and that he won’t die until it orbits earth again. He’s now 37.

The book explores humanity and emotions of grief. Robin lost his mother when he was young and as if that isn’t enough to contend with, his father is also very unwell. . It also explores the impact on this very well and believably through Robin then wanting to design and plan the perfect life to the point of obsession. You can totally empathise with him as he’s far from being present and enjoying things, he’s always working on steps ahead. You can really see why he’s focusing on certain things and doing more existing than truly living life as it’s a lot to deal with.

There is a corner that gets turned when the more relaxed Astrid appears on the scene. This doesn’t come without its challenges as there are revelations that appear.

Danny also comes to the scene and he has dreams to live out and this captures Robin into living life. The pair are like chalk and cheese and yet they work together, especially where Robin is concerned in showing a more present life rather than always looking towards the future and worrying about what may or may not occur.

Happy Is The One is ultimately a heart-warming story that will get you pondering what direction to lead your own life in, will it be always looking ahead, but forgetting about the present, or will it be more enjoying the moment whilst it lasts?

I highly recommend Happy is the One as one not to miss. It just might feed something you didn’t know you needed into your life in a positive way.

About the Author

Katie Allen was a journalist and columnist at Guardian and Observer, starting her career as a Reuters correspondent in Berlin and London. Her warmly funny, immensely moving literary debut novel, Everything Happens for a Reason, was based on her own devastating experience of stillbirth and was a number-one digital bestseller, with wide critical acclaim. Katie grew up in Warwickshire and now lives in South London with her family.

#Review by Lou of The Mistake By MJ Arlidge and Lisa Hall @MJArlidge @lisahallauthor @CompulsiveReaders #BlogTour @TracyFenton

The Mistake
By MJ Arlidge

Review written by Louise Cannon

The Mistake is a chilling, tensely written psychological domestic thriller. The people who have been writing with M.J. Arlidge of late has been working very well for great plots that have been well-written with interesting characters lives you can absorb into. The Mistake is another example how 2 writers can work really well to create something brilliant to read.
Today I am on the Compulsive Readers blog tour. See the blurb and full review below…

Blurb

In this family, everyone is telling lies.

Pete never wanted another child. Before baby Erin was born, they were happy. If Natalie hadn’t got pregnant, he would never have done what he did.

Natalie knows things have been difficult since the surprise arrival of Erin. Life with Pete and their two other children – Emily and Zadie – has been balancing on a knife-edge.

Now their home is full of guests at a party Natalie didn’t want to throw – and she’s about to reach breaking point.

But so is her family.

Because everyone has a secret that they’ve been hiding and when Erin suddenly disappears everyone becomes a suspect.

Surely no one here would want to harm their baby? But after the events of the party there are plenty of people who would want to hurt Natalie.

Including her husband…

Review

In some ways it’s quite a chilling read, but in others, it would take a cold-hearted person not to empathise. Pete and Natalie have children. Things seemed not exactly terrible before. This next baby wasn’t planned and nor does it go to any sort of “script” Natalie has known before. This is the point everything changes.
It deals with the likes of post-natal depression and a stressed out family where no one is coping very well. It’s easy to look in from the outside to know what to do, but the adults in this family are spiralling, making it harder to see how to get help. It just shows that even when you have had babies before, not all pregnancy and post-pregnancy is the same.
What comes next turns The Mistake into a tense, chilling psychological domestic thriller. Erin goes missing, just disappears. There’s plenty of fingers of suspicion flying around and Pete is quite useless in this whole situation. The entire family are deeply affected and have been ever since the mistake of yet another pregnancy.

The Mistake is tense in how it is plotted and certainly makes you think about unplanned pregnancies as well as how any pregnancy can be not as straight-forward as you’d hope and how it affects the family in detrimental ways.

The Mistake is a tightly written plotted book that is one I recommend.

#BloodyScotland Reveals Early Release Tickets – Ian Rankin @Beathigh @KathyReichs to Headline @BloodyScotland

BLOODY SCOTLAND REVEALS THE PROLOGUE

American superstar of crime fiction Kathy Reichs will be the first of a series of Early Releases as Bloody Scotland teases its headline acts for 2025.

The author of the Temperance Brennan novels will be making her first visit to the Stirling festival since 2013. She is a multi-million international bestseller, and the Brennan novels were the inspiration for the TV series Bones.

Tickets for Kathy’s event – in which she will be in conversation with 2025 guest programmer Sir Ian Rankin – will go on sale at noon on Monday 26 May.

A string of further Early Releases – all major names in the crime fiction world – will soon follow so keep your eye on our social media channels.

See www.bloodyscotland.com to spot other early highlights as they drop or follow Bloody Scotland on Facebook, Instagram, X or Blue Sky

The Bloody Scotland 2025 programme – featuring many other HUGE names in the world of crime fiction – will be launched at noon at The Golden Lion in Stirling on Thursday 12 June followed by an event at 1pm with Canadian crime writing superstar, Linwood Barclay. www.bloodyscotland.com

#EdFringe News of Use Your Words – #Comedy about #Motherhood / #Parenting is #WhatsOnEdinburgh this #Summer #UseYourWords @TheSpaceUK #Edinburgh

Use Your Words! a heartfelt comedy about the chaos of new motherhood — told through physical comedy, music, and sheer determination — comes to Edinburgh Fringe 2025!

Photo Credit: Find the Light Photography

Think Charlie Chaplin except he’s a sleep-deprived new mom unable to find a single pair of jeans that fit.

Direct from New York City, Use Your Words! is a one-woman play about a new mother, Kate, struggling with the responsibility of caring for a tiny human. The new comedy, comprised of five scenes, spans Kate’s first glorious days with her newborn, her ensuing sleep-deprivation, her toddler’s shenanigans, and the struggles to consume enough sugar and coffee to survive the challenges of parenthood. The show is rooted in comic physicality with many props mimed—most importantly, the baby. Onstage throughout is a musician, a trumpet player/percussionist, who with his music will exacerbate Kate’s struggles, emphasize her emotional state, or celebrate her successes. There are moments of direct interaction with the audience—sometimes a new parent needs backup!

This play, written by Karen Eleanor Wight, was inspired by her two children, late mother, and 18 years of performing as 1/2 of the improvisational duo Imp. This ground-breaking duo improvised wordless scenes at festivals nationally and internationally with an onstage musician creating silly and inspiring tunes on the spot. This unique play’s script was developed through improv in rehearsals over the course of several years, and then finessed at new works festivals. After a successful run in NYC in 2024 funded by a New York State Council on the Arts Support for Artists Grant, the same artistic team is thrilled to bring the production to Edinburgh this year.

Use Your Words! features Karen Eleanor Wight as Kate and Rodney Umble on trumpet/percussion. Co-directed by Zinc Tong and Karen Eleanor Wight, Sound Design by CJ Whitaker and Ella Danyluk, Lighting design by Jesse Baxter, Production Stage Management by Jenna Arkontaky, and play development by Melissa Attebery.

“Use Your Words! is refreshing and funny as physical storytelling and a personal but universal account of the early phase of motherhood. This style and topic are seriously under-explored– this show is a gift.” ~Ian Morgan, Assoc Artistic Director, The New Group, NYC

“Use Your Words! was truly one of the best things I’ve seen so far this fall. Karen Eleanor Wight’s artistry, skill level, and capacity to hold a room’s attention is impressive.” ~Ria T. DiLullo, Artistic Director of Skeleton Rep, NYC

“Wight’s attention to kinesthetic detail in Use Your Words! brings this hilarious and meaningful journey of motherhood to life. Each of her movements are simultaneously incredibly clear and comedically timed.” ~Joseph Heitman, Artistic Director, One Day Dance, NYC

Venue: theSpace @ Niddry Street

Dates: 18- 23 August 2025

Time: 12:25 (65 minutes)

Ticket prices: £11.00 (£8.00)

Fringe Box office: 0131 226 0000 / www.edfringe.com

Suitable for all ages