Nicki's book blog

Fresh Eggs and Dog Beds by Nick Albert - Memiors “How would they cope with banks that didn’t want customers, builders who didn’t need work, or the complex issue of where to buy some chickens?” Nick has just given up his job due to his health and fortunately redundancy was on the table. He has led a very stressful life and now it’s time for something new. They are looking for somewhere new to live to downsize price wise. After working out the logistics Ireland becomes a possibility. They take a short break to discover what the Emerald Isle has to offer and discover much more than they ever thought! Drivers who wave, people who chat, odd and eccentric nuances that they would never have found in England. I loved this and took to it very early on. It is clearly written from the heart and with a sense of humour along the way. After much deliberation they find their dream house and then a solicitor who doesn’t want to to deal with it because of its probl...

The Woman Downstairs- Elisabeth Carpenter- Suspense Thriller “ Can you ever really know your neighbours?” Sarah lives with her son in a block of flats. She is a journalist student and also works at the local cafe to help pay the bills. On going out early one morning she finds the police at the flat below hers- they have found a body which has apparently been there for at least a couple of years. She thought the flat was empty. No one really knows who lived there or whom the body may be. She picks up a piece of mail which has blown from the flat and finds a name. Could this be the deceased person and why has no one missed them in all that time? Laura lived with her father until he recently died. She has to find a new job as his savings won’t go very far. Her mother left several years ago and Laura hasn’t been out of the house for a long time herself. We know she has some sort of secret but not quite what. Oooh! This got me enveloped early on and kept me w...

Erotic Fiction? by Hannah Lynn-humour/ Romcom #GIVEAWAY ***** “So outrageously funny you'll laugh your knickers off!” Sarah and Drew have two children and a third on the way. They have very little spare time, even less spare cash and more than a chaotic household Sarah used to work as a translator from home but with two children she hasn’t had a chance to get back to it. Drew stumbles upon an idea to make them some money when he accidentally sees an article about the naughty nanny series of books. Having failed to convince Sarah to write , he takes it upon himself in secret to write his first erotic fiction novel.  I was laughing most of the way through this. A household that has an orange child (from pasta sauce), a husband who is engrossed in his “work”, a school mum is practically perfect in every way and a work colleague who thinks Paul l McCarteny is dead.. This is a very easy and highly enjoyable read with a smile on every page. For mo...

Five Wakes And A Wedding by Karen Ross-Romantic comedy “Undertaker Nina Sherwood is your average Millennial with a steady job, a nice home – and dead bodies in her basement.“ Nina has just opened her first ever shop- Happy Endings. After working for a large chain and being fed up with them not putting the customers requirements first and having an ignominious end to that part of her career she decided to become self employed. Happy Endings is not a book shop as many first thought but a funeral directors. It turns out that in that area no-one wants to think about death- they seem to pretend that it doesn’t happen and so for the first few weeks she is left scratching her head as to ideas to get the ball rolling. I enjoyed this from the off. A lead character who has wit and charm and her feet firmly planted on the floor. A little humour along the way always helps, especially with what could be a drab subject and a little romance along the way. Humour and f...

A Dozen Second Chances by Kate Field - Contemporary Romance/Romcom "What are the chances that twelve little tokens could change a life?" Eve works in a school as a P.A. She gave up her dream of archeology when her sister died leaving a two year old daughter Caitlyn. Eve has since brought up Caitlyn as her own and left archeology and a past love Paddy, behind her when he walked out at a critical time in her life. Caitlyn has now become a young woman and is off to Paris to work as an au pair. On leaving she gives Eve a collection of cards each with the instructions that she is to be kind to herself. She has to fill them in with something she has done to fulfill this and then send it to Caitlyn. I took to this very early on. It struck a chord with being kind to yourself- sometimes we put others first in life and forget ourselves in the process. Selfish is very different to self care. Eve had good principles, was selfless , passionate over some thin...

The Truth About Murder- Chris Collett-Crime A disabled man has been mugged at his door and severely injured. He is a lawyer and he receives a visit from a woman and her daughter, the daughter is keen that her mother should do something about the undue pressure that she is receiving at work Stefan once recovered wants to take on the case , not only as the firm is short of work but he perceives something awry. Meanwhile Mick and Denny have a suicide body to sort out. Denny is two weeks away from retiring and moving to Portugal and uncharacteristically is loathed to do any work. When Mick finds a link from the mugging to the suicide the case heats up. I really enjoyed this. It’s told from two perspectives- that of Mick the policeman and and Stefan the lawyer- both characters of which I took to. Each has their own quirks and background story which gives them depth- something I appreciate in a book. Stefan overcame his disabilities and Mick found that the...

THE WRECKAGE by Robin Morgan-Bentley-psychological thriller “ Gripping and sinister, The Wreckage is guaranteed to keep you up all night…” Ben is having a nightmare only he isn’t asleep. He was on the motorway on the way to his school teaching position and a man ran out in front of him.He learned from visiting him in hospital that he had left a note “ Tell Maxy I’m sorry” which relieves some of his guilt. He meets Alice who is Adam’s wife and they develop a relationship. Ben is desperate to make amends and is an anxious nervous sort of guy with little life experience despite his years, naive perhaps. I  liked Ben and felt that he had others best intentions at heart. Yes there is an obsession of sorts but when something like that has happened who is to say how we would react? There are some sensitive subject issues handled very well- mental health, suicide, bereveament etc. and the many layers t hat each of these have and we all have and experience in o...