This was part of my last Mailbox and I liked it as it looked like a happy cover. I had read some heavy stuff over the last two weeks and was looking for light reads. This fitted the bill.
Ellen also known as Ellie was facing crisis after crisis. Her husband had died in a freak accident just over a year ago and Ellie was now beginning to face a financial crisis with no money to pay her mortgage. Never having gone to work and totally dependent on her husband for everything, she started taking in three lodgers. A more unlikely trio you couldn't find. There was Matt a good time boy just starting his career with Bang It (a men's magazine), there was Allegra in her 70s an author of bodice rippers who treated Ellen as a servant almost from the word go, and then there was Sabine from Germany on assignment just after a break up with her pig of her husband (her words not mine!).
Ellen starts off as a timid woman correctly diagnosed as being agoraphobic by her 12 year old son of all people. Ellen has not stepped out of her house not even to her garden or lawn for a year since her husband's death. She ignores the fact that even her groceries are ordered from the supermarket and that she has not attended any school function of her son Charlie and that she seems to be sliding further and further into burying herself in her house. Circumstances force Ellen to change her stance. Her sister Hannah bursts a bombshell on her , Charlie goes missing and Ellen is forced to face her personal devils head on with Matt, Allegra and Sabine firmly supporting her all the way.
Again this book also dealt with relationships. The one between siblings was particularly well done in this book. Apart from rivalry and jealousies, the protective feeling of an elder sister towards her younger sibling was very well written about. The difficulties of dealing with a clever 12 year old is the other relationship which is very well dealt with here. Handling grief, coming to terms with it, not letting it override you for the rest of your life is another poignant part of the story.
I liked this book.
sounds like a good book with lots of good drama. great review mystica--glad you enjoyed it :)
ReplyDeleteGreat review. This sounds like a book I would like.
ReplyDeleteNice review :)
ReplyDeleteI know what you mean about light reads, They are so needed sometimes
this sounds like a wonderful light book. i love the way you describe the different relationships!
ReplyDeleteIt is interesting the different covers they put on different editions. See the one I read http://rannthisthat.blogspot.com/2010/10/home-for-broken-hearts.html Even the title was different (a little)
ReplyDeleteI read this last year and really liked it - have you read some of her other books? They are also very good and I liked them even more than this one.
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