Tag Archives: HistFic

My Summer Reads and Reviews.

Book Review, Writing & Reading, , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

I don’t usually read so many books in a month, but I’ve been focused on relaxing since the summer holidays started (taking a break from teaching), enjoying family time and some time for myself.

I was determined to read a paperback on my holiday in France, whereas I usually read on Kindle or listen to books. Do you count it as “reading” if you listen to a book? I know it’s not the same, but I count it as when I am in school, I listen to books while driving or doing jobs at home or in my classroom. It’s a great way to indulge in the wonderful stories I enjoy.

No matter how I “read” the book, if I enjoy the story, I leave a review. Reviews keep authors going on difficult days and help boost the book’s profile. My reviews vary in length depending on how much time I had to write them, but if you’ve read my blog before, you’ll know the size of the review doesn’t matter. It’s the thought and sharing your appreciation of a good book that counts.

With that in mind, here are my recent reads and reviews.

As you’ll notice, I like reading for escapism and relaxation so I tend to pick books I know I will enjoy: romcoms, romance, and historical fiction (with at least a hint of romance).

You Belong to Me, the sequel to Who’s That Girl?, was the follow-up I didn’t know I needed. Having greatly enjoyed Who’s That Girl?, I absolutely loved You Belong to Me and the opportunity to discover what happened next for Edie. Mhairi McFarlane is one of my favourite writers, and her brilliant way with words shone through. The writing, as always, was pacy and poignant. I was keen to find out what would happen next and so kept turning the pages, all the while knowing I’d be sad to say goodbye to the wonderful characters once I got to the end. Once again, McFarlane masterfully balanced humour and emotion, making You Belong to Me a thoroughly enjoyable read. This book was a delightful continuation of Edie and Elliott’s story, perfect for fans of the first book and anyone looking for a heartwarming romance.

The Fixer Upper is an easy-going, enjoyable romcom. The plot is engaging with a gentle romance. I enjoyed the main characters’ developing friendship, and it was refreshing to read a story with a male lead who wasn’t your stereotypical hero. While there were some unexpected references, they added to the book’s playful and fun nature. Overall, The Fixer Upper was a happy read, perfect for escaping for a few hours.

 

Spring Breeze is a WWII historical novel set in Paris during the German occupation. The story follows Matilde, who initially appears naive and eager to keep a low profile. However, when Matilde’s circumstances change, she determines to fight the enemy however she can. The narrative captures Matilde’s transformation from a passive bystander to a determined and resilient fighter, facing the horrors of war alongside her fellow countrymen with unyielding strength.

Central to the story is the forbidden love between Matilde and Hans, a German soldier who, despite loving his country, abhors the war and its atrocities. Their bond, forged over their attraction, shared love of art, and mutual sense of injustice, is fraught with danger and seemingly insurmountable obstacles. I enjoyed discovering more about each of them as their characters developed through the story. Spring Breeze was an evocative, well-researched novel that shows the horrors of war and its impact on ordinary people thrown into extraordinary circumstances.

Here are some fun facts about buying this book: I decided I should have an actual paperback for my holiday and found it in a charity shop. I love Lucy Diamond’s novels and bought this one despite already having it on Kindle. While in the charity shop, I saw A Summer of Second Chances on the shelf and told the lady beside me I had written it. She bought it and made me smile! After reading The Best Days of Our Lives, I popped it into a book exchange in France for another reader to enjoy. It had gone when I next visited. I hope I introduced someone new to Lucy Diamond’s great stories.

As someone who has lost a sister, goodness, this book was an emotional roller coaster. There is real depth to the characters; you can feel their heartache and struggles as they try to rebuild their lives, which will never be the same again. They make mistakes but also achieve new insights and highs along the way. I loved Alice and felt every step of her emotional journey. There were a lot of characters to follow at first, but I soon found my way with them and followed their family connections with interest. The story made me cry, laugh, and experience all the emotions between; it was another great Lucy Diamond read.

Fake it ’til You Make It was my first Laura Carter read. I really liked the lead characters, Abbey and Ted, and the chemistry they shared throughout. I enjoyed the personal journey both characters went on and the banter they frequently shared. It was a good-fun, light-hearted read. I felt the secrets to be told got a little stretched towards the end, but once all was revealed, I loved the ending every bit as much as I hoped I would. It was a fabulous holiday read that made me smile.

The Law of Attraction is a quick, fun holiday read with likeable characters and a flashy setting. Unless I missed it, I don’t think it was explained how come hot-shot lawyer Drew Harrington seemed to know a lot about romcoms, but I liked him, so I was happy to go with it 😉 I loved Drew’s family and their dynamics. I also liked Drew’s friendship group. The story is told mainly from Drew’s alpha-male perspective, with a few insights into Becky’s past coming from her perspective. It was an enjoyable read (with a few trigger moments regarding Becky’s previous abusive partner). I like Laura Carter’s fresh, pacy writing style and dynamic characters. I also enjoyed the escapist setting, too.

The Spare Room is a sweet story with likeable characters, all the feels, and a happy ever after that will leave you with a warm and fuzzy feeling. I really enjoyed the friendships and some of the quirky family members. There’s an adorable male lead who has watched romcoms and can quote poetry, a likeable female lead, and a cute cat. What more could you want? …

Maybe a dog, but I’m aware that could just be me, haha!

My current read is Beth Moran’s It Had To Be You. My Kindle tells me I am twenty-five per cent into the book. Now I’m home from my holiday, the sun has disappeared, and I’m thinking about all the jobs I should have done this summer, my reading has slowed down somewhat, but I am enjoying it so far.

What have you been reading this summer? It would be great to hear your favourite summer reads. 

Enjoy the final days of August. xx

Meet Three Characters from To The Wild Horizon.

Guest Post, Meet Three Characters, , , , , , , , ,
Today, I am delighted to welcome Imogen Martin to introduce three characters from her latest novel To the Wild Horizon. Over to you, Imogen …

Thank you for inviting me onto your blog Carol.

To The Wild Horizon is my second historical romance and came out in February. It is the story of the Oregon Trail: the pioneer journey from the Midwest to the Pacific coast. Whilst I did plenty of research to get the details right, at its heart this is a slow-burn romance. Here’s an introduction to three characters.

Grace Sinclair

Grace is brave, determined and resourceful. Her parents have died and the most important thing for her is to take her brother Tom to join their older brother who has settled in Oregon. While preparing to leave, Grace shoots her landlord in self-defence. Fearful that being arrested would leave Tom, a twelve-year-old with no-one to protect him, she decides to join the next train leaving town. As the army captain in charge will not let single women travel alone, she pretends to be married. Inevitably, this lie catches up with her.

I loved writing Grace. She has many of the characteristics I admire in a woman. She is hard working, prepared to endure hardship, and helps her fellow pioneers whenever she can. Importantly, she is brave enough to challenge male expectations about what a woman should and shouldn’t be. Grace has many skills: being able to handle a gun is one of the most important.

Captain James Randolph

Whilst Randolph may be tall, dark and handsome, there is no getting round the fact that he’s a misogynist. As the story progresses, the things that shaped his personality are revealed. Initially he’s furious that Grace has deceived him but she talks him into a deal that might let her travel further. He watches her each day in hope that she will fail, but instead begins to fall in love with her. High moral standards are important to Randolph, so he is troubled by his feelings, as he still believes she is a married woman.

Randolph is partly based on a historical figure Captain Randolph B Marcy (as my favourite romantic hero is Mr. Darcy, I thought the coincidence of the name was encouraging). Captain Marcy travelled the Oregon Trails many times and wrote an important book much used by pioneers: “The Prairie Traveler: a handbook for overland expeditions.”

I use images of actors when writing, and this shot of Tom Hughes playing Prince Albert helped me visualise Captain Randolph.

Jane Eliot

Jane is a shy young woman, aged 19. She has a beautiful older sister who sets her cap at Captain Randolph. Jane develops a relationship with Corporal Moore and this leads her to being attacked by an unknown man. Grace puts her own safety at risk in order to find out who the culprit is.

For much of the book, Jane lacks confidence and does not stand up for herself. One of the things I like most are characters who develop over time. In the end, Jane is crucial to the dénouement of the story.

Thank you for the great introduction to your characters, Imogen. I really like the sound of Grace Sinclair. x

About the book:

Missouri, 1846: In the frontier town of Independence the sound of a gunshot shatters the night. As the pistol drops from her hand and clatters to the ground, Grace knows she has no choice but to leave. Now.

In this inspiring and deeply moving story of love, courage and endurance, a young woman on the run from the law sets off on a desperate journey of survival on the treacherous Oregon Trail.

This unputdownable and heart-wrenching historical novel shows the true strength and resilience of a woman’s heart, even when she has everything to lose and the odds are stacked against her. Fans of Kristin Hannah, Amy Harmon and Olivia Hawker will lose themselves in To the Wild Horizon.

What readers say about To the Wild Horizon:

“Incredible!!!!!” Reader review, ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

“One of my favourite reads of the year. I absolutely loved it. A heartwarming, enticing, and intriguing tale of courage, love, compassion and resilience. This story will keep you on edge until the very last page.” Reader review, ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

“I absolutely loved this book. I couldn’t put it down. I couldn’t fall asleep because I had to know what was going to happen next. Incredible… I loved every second.” Reader review, ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Publisher: Storm Publishing
Publication date: 7.2.2024

Link to purchase: To the Wild Horizon.

About the author:

Imogen Martin writes sweeping, historical fiction. Her first two novels are set in nineteenth century America.

As a teenager, she took the Greyhound bus from San Francisco to New York. Over those three days of staring out of the window at the majestic mountains and endless flat plains, stories wound themselves into her head: tales of brooding, charismatic men captivated by independent women.

Since then, she has worked in a coffee-shop in Piccadilly, a famous bookstore, and a children’s home. She has run festivals, and turned a derelict housing block on one of the poorest estates in the UK into an award-winning arts centre.

During 2020 Imogen was selected by Kate Nash Literary Agency as one of their BookCamp mentees, a mentorship programme designed to accelerate the careers of promising new writers.

Married with two children, Imogen divides her time between Wales and Sardinia.

Discover more about Imogen and her work: Twitter | Facebook | Instagram

You can also visit Imogen’s website and join her monthly newsletter. (Sign up to get a FREE map of the Oregon Trail you can look at while reading.)

Location, Location, Location with Eva Glyn.

Guest Post, Location!, Writing & Reading, , , , , , , , ,
Having read and reviewed The Collaborator’s Daughter recently, I am delighted to welcome author, and writing friend, Eva Glyn to my blog as she talks about Dubrovnik, the stunning location of her book. Over to you, Eva …

One of the early reviews for The Collaborator’s Daughter said it was a homage to Dubrovnik and its people, and I thought, ‘job done’. Well, obviously not the book’s only job, but a pretty important one to me.

Writing as Eva Glyn, I am contracted to write books set in Croatia, so location is vitally important. It’s becoming what readers expect when they pick up my book, a virtual trip to that part of the Mediterranean, with its beautiful scenery, fascinating history and warm and welcoming people.

Although I flirted with Dubrovnik in The Olive Grove, The Collaborator’s Daughter is my first book set in the city’s old town, although it will not be the last. For me, there is no finer place to be, with its terracotta roofscape enclosed within medieval walls that rise up and down with the rhythm of the rocks they stand on. Outside, the sea glistens pure azure, and inside, it is so compact it feels like a village.

Of course, in high season particularly, it’s jam-packed with tourists. Not only groups from cruise ships and Game of Thrones fans (it was one of the iconic filming locations) but day-trippers from local resorts and seaside hotels and people staying in the old town itself.

The best advice is to go early or late in the season or early in the day. When I was researching The Collaborator’s Daughter last year, we had to visit in July, but even so, walking the city walls (one of the must-do attractions) at eight in the morning, it was relatively quiet. And I needed to go there because it’s where my main character Fran heads to do some of her thinking as she tries to work out what best to do with her life.

Cat on the city wall.

Another iconic place Fran visits – or rather, is taken by local widower Jadran, is Gradska Kavana for coffee. The terrace is in the centre of some of the major tourist attractions; the Sponza Palace, the Rector’s Palace, Sveti Vlaho (Saint Blaise) church, the bell tower and the famous statue of Orlando. It’s a marvellous place to people-watch and drink a delicious cappuccino. A little pricey for Dubrovnik maybe, but cheaper than most of the UK coffee chains and so much better.

Gradska Kavana terrace.

The Sponza Palace is another location that’s key to The Collaborator’s Daughter. In the 1944 storyline, it is where Fran’s father, Branko, works for the city’s fascist mayor, to use his words in the book, the place the web of evil spins out from. For all that, it is an incredibly beautiful building with a much longer happy history, and inside hides the Memorial Room to the Dubrovnik Defenders, a heart-breaking homage to the men who lost their lives in the Homeland War of the 1990s.

Sponza Palace.

But here I am, beginning to sound like a tourist guide again. I just can’t help it. With somewhere so warm, friendly, and beautiful, I am compelled to keep going back. And to keep writing about it.

Thank you so much for the lovely post and sharing your wonderful pictures, Eva. I greatly enjoyed The Collaborator’s Daughter and wish you every success with it. xx

About the book:

In 1944 in war-torn Dubrovnik, Branko Milisic holds his newborn daughter Safranka and wishes her a better future. But while the Nazis are finally retreating, the arrival of the partisans brings new dangers for Branko, his wife Dragica and their baby…

As an older sister to two half-siblings, Fran has always known she has to fit in. But now, at sixty-five years old and finally free of caring responsibilities, for the first time in her life, Fran is facing questions about who she is and where she comes from.

All Fran knows about her real father is that he was a hero and her mother had to flee Dubrovnik after the war. But when she travels to the city of her birth to uncover the truth, she is devastated to discover her father was executed by the partisans in 1944, accused of being a collaborator. But the past isn’t always what it seems… And neither is the future.

Purchase and discover more here. | See my review here.

About the author:

Eva Glyn writes escapist relationship-driven fiction with a kernel of truth at its heart. She loves to travel and finds inspiration in beautiful places and the stories they hide.

Her last holiday before lockdown was a trip to Croatia, and the country’s haunting histories and gorgeous scenery have proved fertile ground, driven by her friendship with a tour guide she met there. His wartime story provided the inspiration for The Olive Grove, and his help in creating a realistic portrayal of Croatian life has proved invaluable. Her second and third novels set in the country are dual timelines looking back to World War 2, An Island of Secrets and The Collaborator’s Daughter. Eva Glyn is published by One More Chapter, a division of Harper Collins.

Eva lives in Cornwall, although she considers herself Welsh, and has been lucky enough to have been married to the love of her life for more than twenty-five years. She also writes as Jane Cable.

Discover more about Eva Glyn: Website | Facbook | Instagram | Twitter | Newsletter sign up

And, while blogging, I have exciting news to share. All of my romance novels are now available on Kindle Unlimited; enjoy!

Location, Location, Location with Angela Petch.

Guest Post, Location!, Writing & Reading, , , , , , , , , ,
It is always a pleasure to have my lovely writing friend Angela Petch as a guest on my blog, so I couldn’t resist inviting her along to talk about the setting of her latest novel, The Girl Who Escaped. Over to you, Angela …

All my novels, bar one, are set in Italy. I love this beautiful country and am fortunate to live in eastern Tuscany for six months each summer. The setting is very important in all my stories and the way my characters interact with their locations is a way of delving into their personalities and anchoring them to a backdrop. “Everybody has to be somewhere,” said Spike Milligan.

I think it’s better to drop details in little by little rather than describing at length: as if the reader is noticing aspects of the setting from the corner of his or her eye.

Panorama of Urbino.

My latest book, The Girl who Escaped, is set mainly in Urbino, a compact Renaissance city in Le Marche region. I know it quite well because my Italian mother-in-law is from Urbino and I married in a tiny hamlet just outside the city.

Revisiting the hamlet of Castel Cavallino, where we married. 

Nevertheless, I still felt the need to walk about with my notebook and camera to record details.

Writing beneath the twin towers of Urbino’s palace.

The young heroine in my new book is Jewish and about to be sent away from her beloved birthplace to a camp. She has already suffered under Mussolini’s racial laws and denied her university place to study medicine. How to describe the places she will miss?

This is an excerpt from Chapter Six, when Devora is struggling to look after her twin brothers on her own, as her parents have been sent to an internment camp. Their children were born in Italy and so are exempt – at this moment – from being sent away, not being deemed “foreign Jews”.

“She was alone up at the Fortezza, the wind keener than in the city centre, cold air nipping at her cheeks. The clouds over the mountains were heavy with more snow, not unusual in the spring, and she swung her arms back and forth across her chest to warm her body. And then she threw her head back and screamed, howling at the sky like a wild animal, no longer able to contain her anger and frustration. On the rise opposite, the twin towers that had always seemed to her like an illustration from a book of fairy tales now looked menacing: portals to Hell, holding bands of evil, fascist warriors bent on destroying the hopes and dreams of her family: first her father’s livelihood, next her brothers’ schooling, her own medical studies and social life all snatched away simply because they were considered different and undesirable. ‘Idioti, all of you,’ she screamed over and over, her words snatched by the cold breeze.”

While my husband’s grandparents were alive, we stayed with them in Urbino but last year, we rented a small apartment in the old quarter and I spent hours tramping about the city to soak in the atmosphere.  We met the caretaker of the synagogue and she invited us back to her home and she shared more information about the war with us, which made its way into the book.

Me in her library. She is also a writer and was full of useful information.

If a writer can manage to visit the places they write about, it helps so much when painting the scenes. Visiting a location can help bring alive the imagination.

About The Girl Who Escaped:

Italy, 1940. The girl sobs and rages as her father tells her the terrible news. “Italy is entering the war alongside Germany. Jews are to be arrested and sent to camps. We have to be ready.”

As fascists march across the cobbled piazzas and past the towered buildings of her beloved home city, twenty-year-old Devora’s worst fears come true. Along with her Jewish parents and twin little brothers they are torn away from everything they love and sent to an internment camp huddled in the mountains. Her father promises this war will not last long…

When they are offered a miraculous chance of escape by her childhood friend Luigi, who risks everything to smuggle vital information into the camp, the family clambers under barbed wire and races for the border. But Devora is forced to make a devastating choice between saving a stranger’s life and joining her parents. As shots fire in the moonless night, the family is separated.

Haunted by the question of whether they are dead or alive, all Devora can do for their future is throw herself into helping Luigi in the Italian resistenza in the fight for liberty. But posing as a maid for a German commander to gather secret intelligence, Devora is sure she sees her friend one night, in a Nazi uniform…

Is Devora in more danger than ever? And will her family ever be reunited – or will the war tear them apart?

An absolutely devastating but ultimately uplifting historical novel about how love and hope can get us through the darkest times. Perfect for fans of The Tattooist of Auschwitz, Rhys Bowen and Soraya M. Lane.

Purchase here.

Thank you so much for the wonderful insight, Angela. The Girl Who Escaped is my current read and I am greatly enjoying it. xxx

Discover more about Angela Petch’s novels: The Tuscan House | The Postcard From Italy |  A Tuscan Memory |The Tuscan Girl | The Tuscan Secret |

And, while not based in Italy, don’t forget Angela’s wonderful charity novel, Mavis and Dot. All proceeds from this novel go to vital research into Cancer.

About the author:

Published by Bookouture, Angela Petch is an award-winning writer of fiction – and the occasional poem.

Every summer, she moves to Tuscany for six months, where she and her husband own a renovated watermill which they let out. When not exploring their unspoilt corner of the Apennines, she disappears to her writing desk at the top of a converted stable. In her Italian handbag or hiking rucksack, she always makes sure to store a notebook and pen to jot down ideas.

The winter months are spent in Sussex, where most of her family live. When Angela’s not helping out with grandchildren, she catches up with writer friends.

Angela’s gripping WWII, Tuscan novels are published by Bookouture. While her novel, Mavis and Dot, was self-published and tells of the frolics and foibles of two best friends who live by the seaside. Angela also writes short stories published in Prima and People’s Friend.

You can discover more about Angela Petch and her writing here: Facebook | Twitter | website | Amazon | Apricot Plots

Chatting to Vicki Beeby on the release of The Ops Room Girls.

Author Interview, , , , , , , , , ,

Congratulations on your three book deal with Canelo and the release of The Ops Room Girls! I love the cover and as it has just landed on my kindle, I’m looking forward to reading it.

Thanks, Carol, and thanks for giving me a spot on your blog!

To get us started, please tell us a little about your novel:

When working class Evie Bishop must seek a new future for herself, she is inspired to contribute to the war effort and joins the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force as an Ops Room plotter. Posted to a fighter station, Evie befriends two other WAAFs – shy, awkward May and flirty, glamorous Jess. The three girls band together to overcome challenges, navigate new romances and keep their pilots safe in the skies. But the German bombers seem to know more than they should about the base’s operations, and soon Evie, May and Jess are caught up in a world more dangerous than they ever imagined…

It sounds great. What was the inspiration behind the story?

I’ve always been a fan of old World War Two films, and often wondered what the women were doing in RAF films who could be seen in the background, placing blocks on a map. When I started researching for a novel about WAAFs, I remembered these women, and discovered that they were called ‘plotters’. Their role was to plot incoming enemy aircraft so that squadrons could be directed to intercept them. I immediately realised this was the perfect role for my maths-loving heroine, Evie, and so the story developed around Evie and her friends serving in an RAF fighter station during the Battle of Britain.

I do enjoy books about friendship and when I interviewed you previously, for VE Day, I was hooked when you mentioned the three women in your story. I’d love to know more about each of them:

I love books about friendship, too, and I’m having a great time writing about Evie, May and Jess who each have their own book in the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force series.

Evie Bishop is a maths geek, quiet, serious and very independent. She’s also a rather driven character—she spent her childhood in pursuit of her dream of getting into Oxford and has never had any real friends. I really enjoyed writing about how she falls for a certain handsome pilot and blossoms under the friendships she makes in the WAAF. Which brings us to…

…May Lidford. She’s tall, awkward and shy. She joined the WAAF to escape her bullying father and was posted to the Motor Transport section. As a result of her downtrodden past, she suffers from a lack of backbone, and it’s going to take a lot of encouragement from Evie and Jess to get her to stand up for herself.

Finally, there’s Jess, who is very different from the other two. She was an actress before she joined the WAAF and is glamorous, confident and a complete flirt. While she says she joined up to meet pilots, she might have had other reasons, which will become apparent over the course of the series.

There’s a brief mention of romance in the blurb, how strong is the romance element? 

There’s romance for all three of my heroines, and I would say it’s a significant part of each book. However, your question has really made me think because I changed my mind about the prominence of the romance sub-plot during the progress of book one. I set out to focus far more on the romance, with May and Jess being only minor characters. However, I fell in love with the friendship as I wrote, and Jess and May took a more prominent role than originally intended. I would now say the friendship carries an equal weight with the romance storyline, if not stronger. I’d love to find out what readers think!

Writing about the past necessitates detailed research, have you discovered any surprises along the way?

It’s always the little details that I enjoy discovering. I was particularly amused to learn that the WAAFs were issued knickers as part of their uniform—enormous black (or navy—I’ve read conflicting reports) monstrosities with elastic at the legs as well as the waist. They were universally hated and called ‘blackouts’.

Oh goodness, they sound like my horrid high school PE shorts!

With the book out just yesterday (whoop whoop) I know it’s early days, but are there any early reviews you could share that have truly made you smile?

I’ve been blown away by the reviews on NetGalley and from other authors who were sent ARCs. One in particular that made me all emotional was from the author, Terri Nixon, this part in particular:

“I can’t say enough about the gorgeous writing – such a smooth, effortless style, allowing the reader to sink into the story of these girls and their frightening, but rewarding, new world. We live every moment with them, from the panic and uncertainty of a desperately important new job, to the crumbly, cinnamon-sweetness of a Chelsea bun, to the bone-trembling impact of an enemy shell.”

Wow, what a great review and here’s the blurb:

When Evie’s dreams come crashing down, she’s determined to still make something of herself in these trying times…

It is 1939 and working class Evie Bishop has received a scholarship to study mathematics at Oxford when tragedy turns her life upside down. Evie must seek a new future for herself and, inspired to contribute to the war effort, joins the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force as an Ops Room plotter.

Posted to a fighter station on the Sussex Coast, Evie befriends two other WAAFs – shy, awkward May and flirty, glamorous Jess. Faced with earning the approval of strict officers and finding their way in a male dominated world, the three girls band together to overcome challenges, navigate new romances and keep their pilots safe in the skies.

But the German bombers seem to know more than they should about the base’s operations, and soon Evie, May and Jess are caught up in a world more dangerous than they ever imagined…

And those all important links to buy: Amazon | Kobo | Google | Apple

Thank you so much for stopping by Vicki and I wish you every success with The Ops Room Girls and the rest in the series. xx

About the author:

Vicki Beeby writes historical fiction about the friendships and loves of service women brought together by the Second World War.

Her first job was as a civil engineer on a sewage treatment project, so things could only improve from there. Since then, she has worked as a maths teacher and education consultant before turning freelance to give herself more time to write.

In her free time, when she can drag herself away from reading, she enjoys walking and travelling to far-off places by train. She lives in Shropshire in a house that doesn’t contain nearly enough bookshelves.

Discover more about Vicki Beeby ( who also writes as Tora Williams) and her work here: Facebook | Twitter | Website | Apricot Plots

Join me next week when author Gina Hollands shares a Feel Good Friday read! xx