This was the first time in months that I have been able to get hold of the Book of the Month for our online book club hosted by Leslie.
Nora is a writer of screen plays, the kind of thing that you find on the romance channels. There's a formula to them, and not particularly hard to write but they are a reliable source of income. When her husband Ben leaves the family home, she decides to write a totally different type of story and turns their unhappy experience into a script which happens to be picked up for a big screen production. She is amazed to find out that the director wants to film some of the story on location at her house and as they are paying so well, she agrees on the proviso that they are only there for a few days.
The filming comes to an end, but Leo - the handsome actor playing Nora's ex-husband - asks to remain for longer. Nora is reluctant but when he offers to pay her a thousand dollars a day in return for staying a week in her summer house, it is an offer she finds hard to refuse.
Her children are thrilled, Bernadette is bowled over by the thought of a handsome superstar living in their home, and Arthur is excited to have a real life actor helping him rehearse for his part in a play at school. Seven days isn't that long to have him stay is it?
Leo's stay becomes extended and his relationship with Nora changes, his presence in their lives grows until he is called away to audition for another film. I can't say any more without giving away spoilers but what I can say is this - I really enjoyed this book! I felt that I knew, and liked, the main characters and could understand the reasons why they acted the way they did. Would I recommend it? Yes!
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I'm a great fan of the podcast 'Older and Wider' which is hosted by Jenny Eclair and Judith Holder and so I decided to try 'Moving', a book written by Jenny for my next book choice.
This is the story of Edwina, a lady in her late 70s who has made the difficult decision to move from the house where she lived with her family for many years. The large house is much too big for her to manage on her own and she now only lives in a small portion of it. As she shows the young estate agent around her home, each room brings back memories of the family life she is leaving behind. We learn about her twins from her first marriage, Rowena and Charlie, and also her second husband and stepson, Lucas. The estate agent is merely seeing the house as a potential sale property but Edwina realises that each room has it's own impact on her life.
So as we close the door on Edwina while she puts her house on the market we move onto Fern, a university student living in Manchester where she shares her house with a real mix of people, one of whom is Charlie, one of Edwina's twins. Charlie is not quite the kind of character you would expect to be Edwina's son to be and we start to see an alternative side to Edwina's memories.
Next we meet Lucas. Edwina's stepson who has always been the apple of his mother Barbara's eye. He does not fit into Edwina's family in any way so it is interesting to hear his side to the stories that we have already heard. As always, there are two sides to every story and Lucas' version of events is interesting to read. There has been no love lost between him and Edwina, especially after being seemingly instrumental in Charlie's downfall.
It is interesting to see how these very different people have had their lives intertwined and while I really thought I wouldn't like Lucas, I could see the reasons why he behaved as he did and towards the end of the book, it is nice to see that he has a crisis of conscience and does the right thing towards Edwina. It will never undo what has gone before but it means that she can leave the house with a lot of loose ends tidied up.
There were parts of this book that I felt could have been made shorter, but overall I enjoyed the storyline, and there remains one little mystery twist in the final chapter where the reader will have to make their own decision as to the truth in Fern's answer!
