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Maureen Stapleton - Editorial Expert
Maureen Stapleton, a writer and journalist, has written for The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Radio Times, Heat, and many others. She is the associate director of the Greenwich Book Festival, and is a prize manager for the Comedy Women in Print Prize. As a proud holder of both British and American citizenship, she is bilingual in hot drinks (coffee and tea).
Two women lead very different lives in London as World War One breaks out in this epic historical novel.
Fans of Downton Abbey will love The Girls Who Dared to Love by Diney Costeloe, which is focussed on two very disparate women—one upstairs, one downstairs-- as Britain enters the war. Lucy, a newly married socialite whose husband gets sent off to the front in France, and Mabel, the accidental owner of a printing business who is trying to be successful in a man’s world. What the two have in common is they are both spirited and ... View Full Review
Beth and Nick meet in the first week at university, become fast friends and soon fall in love. But their happily ever after is derailed after a fire tears through their accommodation block in the first term, killing one of their flatmates.
After the Fire by Charlotte Rixon charts the highs and lows of their relationship for the next fourteen years. The highs: Getting their degrees. Finding their feet in their careers. Finding love elsewhere. The lows: The bumps of new adulthood. Medical emergencies. Career changes. They remain friends throughout, but the timing for one or the other ... View Full Review
When Assistant Commissioner of Police Borei Gowda is assigned to solve the suspicious death of right-wing critic Professor Mudgood in Bangalore, he knows from experience there is more to the case than it first appears.
Hot Stage by Anita Nair, the third in the Inspector Gowda series, capably handles all the hallmarks of a good police procedural mystery. Grumpy inspector? Check. Meddling bosses? Check. Misdirections and red herrings? Check and check.
But where it differs from British police procedurals is that this novel captures the chaotic energy of modern India, with its bumper-to-bumper traffic, unfinished construction projects and wandering ... View Full Review
The pain and suffering of World War Two have not diminished on Jersey in the summer of 1945, as two women find their lives entwined as they navigate post-war life in Beyond Summerland by Jenny Lecoat.
Jean Parris learns that her father has died in prison after being arrested during the war for listening to the BBC on his contraband radio. She suspects Hazel le Tourneur is the informant, as she was seen arguing with him soon before his arrest. After five long years of Nazi occupation, the atmosphere on Jersey is suffused with suspicions and accusations.
Jean and Hazel form ... View Full Review
Gabriel Stokes has fled his life in London to join his friend in Oregon, hoping to leave behind the violence and corruption he’s seen as member of Metropolitan Police. But once he arrives, he discovers that Oregon provides the same violence and corruption he saw in London, just with a different accent.
Dark Frontier by Matthew Harffy takes the reader on a journey through the nascent American west, where land grabs were common, guns were prolific and justice is served by force, rather than the courts. Like all great westerns, this one has the usual cast of ... View Full Review
Retired nurse Dot is painfully lonely. A widow with no family, she spends her days creating stories of the people she observes-- but never talks to—and trying to extend her meagre budget. The only excitement in her life comes from her penchant for shoplifting, which she does at the local garden centre and Christmas shop.
Even with her thin budget, the one thing she does without fail every week is play the lottery. The six numbers she always plays come from significant moments in her life, which are explained in chapter flashbacks, and the seventh is left to ... View Full Review
It might be difficult to believe in the healing power of cows, but Dave Mountjoy will convince you.
In his memoir, Being With Cows, he recounts how he and his wife, Diana, had moved to the French Pyrenees and were casting about for business ideas for their beautiful plot of land. After learning that they would be able to convert one of the barns into a residence if they acquired some farm animals, they decided to buy some cows. Having spent time on his mother’s family farm in Worcestershire countryside, it seemed the most logical next step.
They ... View Full Review
Single mum Taylor is trying to make a living altering clothes while dreaming of being a fashion designer. Accountant Harry, who is an enthusiastic trainspotter, is trying to recover from his broken heart. The classic will they-won’t they get together forms the heart of this book.
Second Chances at the Board Game Café by Jennifer Page is the third in the series, where the eponymous café serves as the central meeting point for a whole cast of characters in the fictional Yorkshire town of Hebbleswick. This time, the café plays host to a sewing and ... View Full Review
Robyn Tessier, the young new owner of a chaotic used bookstore in Ballycove, Ireland, doesn’t really know what she’s doing, but she loves books and hopes that will be enough. Her mother, Fern, is an internationally renowned artist going through her own personal drama. Joy Blackwood, an American by way of Paris, shows up at the bookshop hoping for a quick visit but instead leaves as Robyn’s first (volunteer) employee.
The three women create the triad of stories in The Bookshop Ladies by Faith Hogan, where friendships are formed, secrets are revealed, and most ... View Full Review
Women absorb negative messages about themselves throughout their life. Too thin. Too fat. Too short. Too tall. Too loud. Too quiet. No matter what they do, it’s the wrong thing.
Kara Loewentheil, host of the “Unf*ck Your Brain” podcast wants to help. Her message is simple: she wants to change women’s thought patterns so that the negative messages are no longer heard. In Take Back Your Brain she gives strategies, pointers and exercises in how to do just that.
To be clear, while this book might have some helpful pointers for all people ... View Full Review
Abi Mason lives a very fast life in London, with exacting to do lists and a strict no second dates policy. But a chance holiday in Tuscany upends all of those habits and changes her life as she learns to slow down.
Like all good romantic comedies, Carrie Walker’s Escape to the Tuscan Vineyard features mistaken identities, missed opportunities and misunderstandings, but also luscious settings, enviable excursions and a chance at love.
Under the scorching summer sun, Abi makes the most of the Italian la dolce vita, enjoying the Italian food, the Italian wine and even one Italian-American ... View Full Review
After 20 years away from the world of antiques, Freya Lockwood finds herself pulled back into it when her former mentor is found dead at the bottom of the stairs in his antique shop. Joined by her glamourous Aunt Carole, Freya must find the murderer and herself.
“The Antique Hunter’s Guide to Murder” by debut author C.L. Miller is both a cosy crime mystery, to solve the murder of Freya’s mentor Arthur Crockleford, and also a treasure hunt at a historic manor house in Suffolk. Like any good Agatha Christie, there is a large ... View Full Review
