Love Letters is the chick lit version of a long, rambling walk in the countryside. Accompany twenty-six year old Laura Horsley, as she moves from being a behind-the-scenes bookshop assistant to a hands-on organizer of a fledgling literary festival that is set in a quaint pocket of the English countryside. One of the biggest tasks entrusted to her is to pull in the Irish best-selling author, Dermot Flynn. The tempestuous wordsmith is suffering from a raging case of Writer’s Block and has become a recluse in his Irish hometown of Ballyfitzpatrick. Shock-and-Awe Dermot could prove be the turning point of Laura’s cloistered existence. She’s in danger of losing not only her inhibitions but also her heart.
Laura is a lovely heroine. She is shy, talented, soft-hearted and with an ability to laugh at herself without being maudlin or Bridget Jones-y. Dermot Flynn reminded me of Gerard Butler in P.S.I Love You . If you liked the rakishly handsome, Irish brogue talking Gerry, you’ll be quite enchanted by Dermot. In fact, if they make a summer rom-com based on this movie, I am pretty sure that the casting director will be imagining Butler stomping around the Irish countryside…playing the temperamental, womanising writer to the hilt.
The book appealed to me for it’s whole ‘book-lovers’ angle. I understood Laura’s love for the written word. I also enjoyed the peek into the coming together of a literary fest with it’s entourage of harried organizers, demanding sponsors, frightening agents and nervous first-timers.
Katie Fforde’s books are light, the epitome of breezy and ideal for those times when you just want to read a love story without making your brain go into overdrive.
I picked up this book purely for the Cover-Art. The summary was hardly informative, but the lovely shiny cover with it’s zany artwork and quirky title yelled out to the impulsive buyer in me. I am happy to report that the story was charming and wholly engaging.
Heather P. Smith is an imperfect 13-year old in a perfect family. Her handsome dentist dad, her elegant mum, her talented and stunningly good lookin’ elder brother Jo-Jo and her l'il fairy princess of a sister, Tallie make a circle of "wowness". And then there’s Heather, who is scruffy and prone to eccentricities and short-term hobbies. The one that has lasted longest is her habit of collecting abandoned soft toys from the pavement, washing them up and giving them a home in her room. The Wombat, as she calls herself has made her peace with her dreary existence, accepting the fact that she’s the abnormal glitch in her perfect family vehicle.
But then one day, her dad drops a bombshell. He is leaving home and the family, and in a flash, everything unravels. Suddenly Heather seems to be the only sane person in a house where everyone is coping with the shock in their own distinctive (and batty ) way. Heather’s mum goes from staying cooped up in a darkened room to taking Salsa Classes. Perfect Jo-Jo is managing an Indie band, wearing eyeliner and providing shelter to a displaced Goth Girl who stores her vivid nail-polish bottles in the cheese counter of the fridge. Pink Princess Tallie has decided to embrace her feral side and has taken to punking up her teddy bear and doing quite a slap up job on herself.
The subject of separation and it’s far-reaching emotional consequences has been handled with some poignant thoughts and bucketloads of humour. The characters are zany and lovable for their distinctive shades of whackiness. In all a fun read and something that made me glad that I 'judged a book by it’s cover'.
My reading of this book was interspersed with regular visits to Google. I looked up all things twenties. From crooning saxophones to flighty flappers to shingled hair to the Charleston to Cloche hats to Broadway (nicknamed Satan’s Circus)…all things insane and outrageous caught my fancy. The Roaring Twenties was the stop-gap between two World Wars and the ladies of the day were rebellious and spirited. World War I had decimated a generation of young men and in it’s aftermath, the young girls refused to sit around, waiting for the existing gentlemen to make a formal indication of their intentions. Instead, the Flappers (as they were called) slipped into shimmery frocks, stuck jaunty feathers in their headbands, stepped out of their cloistered existences and had a swingin’ time!
Say hello to Sadie Lancaster, one such Flapper from 1929. Only now, the year is 2009 and Sadie is a ghost…a ghost who has decided to haunt her frazzled grand-niece, Lara Lington. Lara’s plate of woes is overflowing. She is a corporate head-hunter of a sinking firm and has a business partner who is cooling her heels in Goa. Lara has also been dumped by her boyfriend, Josh. And to top it all, she’s seems to be a constant source of disappointment to her parents. So, when a screechy, pushy and temperamental ghost starts telling her to find an antique dragonfly necklace, Lara is convinced that she’s finally gone round the bend.
But co-existing with a ghost from the 1920s can be quite nifty. Suddenly, she’s dressing up in drop-waists and cloche hats and indelible makeup and dancing with sullen but rakishly handsome men. She is getting a chance to make up with her old boyfriend and find out what made him run scared. She’s caught up in the mystery of a missing necklace and is playing amateur detective with a vengeance. And amidst it all, she’s having a rip-roaring time.
Twenties Girl is one of Sophie Kinsella’s better offerings. Lara Lington is a heroine who runs true to Kinsella form. She’s a bit batty and frivolous, has an interesting fashion-sense, an almost non-existent business sense and the tendency to whine and whinge and land herself into embarrassing situations at the drop of a hat. But also true to the author’s style, she develops a backbone, business acumen, the ability to “get-her-man” and set things right by the time you hit the last few pages. Sadie was an odd character. I oscillated between immense irritation at her self-absorbed shrill fits and a sense of sympathy for her disappointment at never having accounted for much in her 105 years. And although the book was a tad on the long drawn out side, the only thing that kept me hooked was the interesting premise of getting a glimpse into the glorious twenties. I enjoyed scouring the net for tiny peeks into an era which was glorious, uninhibited and most definitely “the bees-knees”!
Love Letters is the chick lit version of a long, rambling walk in the countryside. Accompany twenty-six year old Laura Horsley, as she moves from being a behind-the-scenes bookshop assistant to a hands-on organizer of a fledgling literary festival that is set in a quaint pocket of the English countryside. One of the biggest tasks entrusted to her is to pull in the Irish best-selling author, Dermot Flynn. The tempestuous wordsmith is suffering from a raging case of Writer’s Block and has become a recluse in his Irish hometown of Ballyfitzpatrick. Shock-and-Awe Dermot could prove be the turning point of Laura’s cloistered existence. She’s in danger of losing not only her inhibitions but also her heart.
