Book review The Takedown by Evie Hunter

The Takedown by Evie Hunter

The Takedown by Evie Hunter

A woman scorned...

On board the superyacht Perseus, moored in the glamorous harbour in Antibes, Freya Addison is settling into her new role as hostess.

The other crew members all like Freya, she is calm and diligent and a hard worker, but what they don’t know is that Freya has a secret and an ulterior motive for being on board.

Revenge will be hers.

Because Freya isn’t here to travel the world in style. She has her sights set on one thing only, bringing down the owner of the yacht - the rich and arrogant Julian Falcon.

A man who ripped the heart out of Freya’s family.

And a man she will make pay…

The Takedown by Evie Hunter

My Review

Having visited Antibes and gawped with wonder at the size of the superyachts in the harbour, I couldn’t wait to step on board, even if this book is not my usual go-to read. 

It soon became clear that it is a book about risks, revenge and achieving goals. There is little place for emotions and the excesses and greed were a world away from anything I am used to, but I was easily absorbed within the pages. 

 

The Takedown by Evie Hunter

Freya risks everything putting herself in such a prominent position on Julian Falcon’s superyacht, integrating into the small team of dedicated staff, ready to drop anything for him. Hiding her motive for revenge, while living in close proximity to everyone else, was never going to be easy.

Julian didn’t get to where he was without taking risks along the way, but what he considered his strength, his ability to use those around him for his own advantage, made him enemies. As the interesting back stories of the guests and staff onboard were slowly revealed, so were other risk-takers and game players. These constantly changed my ideas of where the book was going and how successful I thought Freya was likely to be. One by one, she makes discoveries that she has to judge, will they help her in her goal, or will they become a threat? 

Julian was a nasty piece of work and seeing him sweat when his plan began to unravel was as enjoyable for me as it was for Freya, but his power and influence over others was not to be underestimated. 

Revenge, in this case, is best served with a chilled glass of Champagne and a view of the sparkling Mediterranean. 

 

Purchase links

French Village Diaries is a participant in the Amazon EU Associates Programme, an affiliate advertising programme designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.co.uk at no extra cost to you.

Amazon UK link 

Purchase Link 

Evie Hunter

 

About the author

Evie Hunter is a British author and a bit of a nomad, who's spent the last twenty years roaming the world and finding inspiration from the places she's visited. An animal lover and recently widowed, she's now settled back in the UK with her rescued Spanish Podenco, Markos. Keep up to date with all her releases by joining her mailing list 

The Takedown by Evie Hunter

Social media

Facebook 

Twitter 

Newsletter Sign Up 

Bookbub profile

French-themed reading bingo

This year I’ve set myself a reading challenge bingo, with twenty-five different types of French themed books to tick off. This book nicely ticks off “A thriller set in France”.

 

French Village Diaries reading bingo 2024

  

Book review Annie in Paris by Carmen Reid

Annie in Paris by Carmen Reid

Annie in Paris by Carmen Reid

Personal shopper Annie Valentine is back! Older and bolder!

Fashion guru Annie is struggling to cope with her hectic life. With the demands of two older children, plus four-year-old twins, her marriage to Ed is in a romance-free rut and she’s clinging by a couture thread to her job as the nation’s favourite fashion fixer.

And where is Svetlana, her multi-millionaire friend, when Annie needs her? Busy with an expensive mid-life crisis, that's where!

When Ed gets the chance to teach in Paris, Annie thinks time apart could be the answer. Wrong!

In Paris, Ed transforms into a debonair silver fox, attracting the attentions of stylish siren Sylvie.

Annie can’t lose her man or the job she loves, so bundling her bags, her babies and a reluctant Svetlana onto the Eurostar, she sets off to the rescue. But can the City of Love deliver the ooh la la that her marriage, and her fashion series, so desperately needs?

Another brilliant laugh out loud emotional read, perfect for fans of Fiona Gibson, Tracy Bloom and Sophie Ranald! 

Annie in Paris by Carmen Reid

My Review

I should start this review by admitting that I am no fashion guru, I dislike shopping and tragically, until reading this book, was new to the whole world of Annie Valentine and personal shopping. I blame twenty years living in a forgotten French village, but helpfully this book starts with a great introduction to bring all readers up to date with who is who. My initial panic about not being fashionable enough even to carry on reading was calmed by Carmen herself admitting she loves to recycle clothes and buy second-hand where possible, phew, and by the end of the prologue I was as hooked as any fan.

Annie in Paris by Carmen Reid

This book is full pace from the beginning as we are thrown into the chaotic life of Annie Valentine, who is just about managing to juggle 101 tricky family and work situations without losing the plot. These challenges, and her calm outward manner, immediately warmed me to her and ensured that throughout the book I was fighting her corner when things got more complex. 

I loved the French snippets of advice that headed up each chapter, despite it being a book that is as much about relationships as it is about fashion. 

Paris as a location sparkled and provided some classic scenes, including inside bistros, hidden courtyards and the contents of a real Parisian woman’s wardrobe. This book is great mix of entertaining situations that often had me grinning away as I read it, as well as being moving and thought provoking. With Annie, Ed and Svetlana experiencing new emotional stages of their lives, it highlighted the changing perceptions we all encounter as we mature and dip our toes into a mid-life crisis.

If you are looking for a quick, fun escape to Paris, this is the book for you.

Purchase links

French Village Diaries is a participant in the Amazon EU Associates Programme, an affiliate advertising programme designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.co.uk at no extra cost to you.

 

Amazon UK link 

Carmen Reid

 

About the author

Carmen Reid is the bestselling author of numerous woman’s fiction titles including the Personal Shopper series starring Annie Valentine. After taking a break from writing she is back, introducing her hallmark feisty women characters to a new generation of readers. She lives in Glasgow with her husband and children.

Social media

Facebook 

Twitter 

Instagram 

Newsletter Sign Up

Bookbub profile 

Annie in Paris by Carmen Reid

Book review of The French Cookery School by Caroline James

The French Cookery School by Caroline James

The French Cookery School by Caroline James  

Mix together a group of mature students:

A culinary Sloane, a take-away cook and a food journalist.

Add in:

A handsome host

Season with:

A celebrity chef

Bring to the boil:

At a luxurious cookery school in France!

Waltho Williams has no idea what he’s letting himself in for when he opens the doors of La Maison du Paradis, his beautiful French home. But with dwindling funds, a cookery school seems like the ideal business plan. 

Running away from an impending divorce, super-snob Caroline Carrington hopes a luxurious cookery holiday will put her back on her feet. Blackpool fish and chip café owner Fran Cartwright thinks she’s won the lottery when her husband Sid books her on a week working alongside a celebrity chef. Meanwhile, feeling she is fading at fifty, journalist Sally Parker-Brown hopes her press week covering the cookery course will enable her to boost her career.

But will the eclectic group be a recipe for success, or will the mismatched relationships sink like a souffle? 

Whip out an apron, grab a wooden spoon and take a culinary trip to La Maison du Paradis, then sit back and enjoy The French Cookery School!

 

The French Cookery School by Caroline James

My Review

A good chef will always say that recipes should start with quality ingredients and this book had those aplenty, from a fabulous mix of characters to superb descriptions of a location that came to life. It is always a lovely surprise to find myself in a book that is set in a less well-known area of France, but to find myself close enough to home that I recognised where I was, put a huge grin on my face. Chauvigny with its medieval castles, the famous macarons of Montmorillon and the abbey at St Savin, are just a stone’s throw from Poitiers, and this book made me want to plan return day trips.

The French Cookery School by Caroline James

Everyone present at La Maison du Paradis cookery retreat is looking for something or escaping their demons, and that included owner Waltho. At the beginning they didn’t seem an obvious friendship group and I wondered how easily they would gel together, but gently simmered in the heat of the French countryside, the chemistry soon began to happen. The author cleverly crafted the plot so that everyone’s strengths and weaknesses had their moment in the spotlight, yet no one personality (flavour) dominated. In fact, I’d say they all complimented each other and were enhanced by a little bit of French magic. 

I always looked forward to finishing my day lost in the pages of this book and often fell asleep wondering where tomorrow’s chapter would take me.

There is so much more to this book than the delicious food served between its pages. It’s about emotions and recovery, and left me with a warm, satisfied feeling, much like a fine meal savoured in the company of great friends. If you enjoy books where the characters embark on uplifting personal journeys, and you want a location that sticks with you (hopefully making you open your map of France and plan a visit), then do add this to your summer reading list. I might even see you wandering the steep cobbled streets of Chauvigny or Montmorillon one day and we could chat about books from the terrace of a café.

Montmorillon macaron museum, as featured in
The French Cookery School by Caroline James

Purchase links

French Village Diaries is a participant in the Amazon EU Associates Programme, an affiliate advertising programme designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.co.uk at no extra cost to you.

Amazon UK link 

 

Caroline James

About the author

Caroline James always wanted to write, but instead of taking a literary route, followed a career in the hospitality industry, which included owning a pub and a beautiful country house hotel. She was also a media agent representing celebrity chefs. When she finally glued her rear to a chair and began to write, the words flowed, and several novels later, she has gained many bestseller badges for her books.

The French Cookery School is Caroline’s tenth novel. Previously, The Cruise, described as: ‘Girl power for the over sixties!’ was an Amazon Top Ten Best Seller. Caroline’s hilarious novels include The Spa Break and The Best Boomerville Hotel, depicted as ‘Britain’s answer to the Best Marigold Hotel’.

She likes to write in Venus, her holiday home on wheels and in her spare time, walks with Fred, her Westie, or swims in a local lake. Caroline is a member of the Romantic Novelists Association, the SOA, ARRA and the Society of Women’s Writers & Journalists. She is also a speaker with many amusing talks heard by a variety of audiences, including cruise ship guests.

 

Social media

Facebook 

Twitter

Instagram 

The French Cookery School by Caroline James

 

Books by Caroline James

The French Cookery School might be the first of her books I’ve read, but I’ll be looking up her others:

The Cruise

The Spa Break

Hattie Goes to Hollywood

Boomerville at Ballymegille

The Best Boomerville Hotel

Coffee Tea the Gypsy & Me

Coffee Tea the Chef & Me

Coffee Tea the Caribbean & Me

Jungle Rock

French-themed reading bingo

This year I’ve set myself a reading challenge bingo, with twenty-five different types of French themed books to tick off. This book nicely ticks off “A book about French food”.

 

French themed reading bingo challenge

 

Book review The Bordeaux Book Club by Gillian Harvey

The Bordeaux Book Club by Gillian Harvey

The Bordeaux Book Club by Gillian Harvey 

 

Love books? The Bordeaux Book Club is seeking new members!

 

When Leah and her husband moved to France, it was with the dream of becoming self-sufficient. But in truth, it’s not the ‘good life’ she’d imagined, as three hours of digging barely yields a single straggly carrot. Worse, her teenage daughter is acting up, and her husband seems to find every strange excuse under the hot French sun to disappear.

 

So when her friend entreats her to join the new bookclub she’s forming, Leah decides it’s something she will do for herself. The chance to make new friends, to drink a few glasses of wine, and to escape into stories that take her miles away from the life she’d thought would be her own happy-ever-after.

 

But the book club is a strange group of misfits. There’s prickly Grace, who lives alone and seems to know everybody and like no-one. Buttoned-up Monica, who says her husband is away and appears to be parenting her baby all alone. Handsome builder George, who has barely read a book before. And Alfie – who is a full two decades younger than everyone else, and is hiding a devastating secret…

 

As the stories they read begin to bring the new friends closer together, Leah is about to discover that happy-ever-afters don’t always look how you expect them to…

 

A gorgeously escapist read from the bestselling author of A Year at the French Farmhouse, perfect for fans of Veronica Henry, Jo Thomas and Fiona Valpy.

The Bordeaux Book Club by Gillian Harvey

 

My Review

The Bordeaux Book Club is another engaging read from Gillian Harvey that I looked forward to falling into each evening. As well as the relatable characters we meet at Grace’s inaugural book club, the cameos played by the heroes and heroines of the classics they chose to read, totally ticked my book worm boxes, and had me adding a reread of some of these books to my ‘to be read’ pile.

 

The book group are a mix of ages and personalities, most of whom would never have crossed paths with each other without the initiative of Grace. Things may have begun a little awkwardly at first, but they soon appreciated the new friendships they found. This book cleverly weaves many aspects of life in France and the adjustments needed when you arrive in a new country, into a plot where friendship is at its heart. It is emotional, with the ups and downs of life changes for them all, but most especially Alfie. It is also a book about books, well-known characters and the power of the great classics and what they can teach us today. 

The Bordeaux Book Club by Gillian Harvey

 

I can’t work out whether I was amused or horrified that I saw a little bit of me in bossy Grace, the association queen, Monica, a stay-at-home mum whose husband works away, and Leah, doing her best to juggle a veggie garden, chickens, and family life, despite the hard work and many setbacks thrown her way. I’m putting this down to Gillian’s expert eye on the British arrivals she has met over many years of living in France and nothing to do with the life I’ve carved out for myself here these last twenty years being weird enough to be a book plot….

 

Grace especially stole my heart with her wise words to the others, when they needed them most, so I thought I’d share my favourite quote here:

 

“But that’s why it’s important to have a good relationship with yourself. To be your own champion, cheerleader. To be the person who forces you to get up, to go out and try something new.” 

 

If, like me, you have devoured Gillian’s previous books (see below), or are a lover of classic authors like Bronte, Dickens or Flaubert, I am sure you will get a lot of enjoyment and entertainment by joining The Bordeaux Book Club. I know that I want to move to Bordeaux just to join Grace’s book club!

 

Previous books by Gillian Harvey:

A Month in Provence 

The French Château Escape 

One French Summer 

A Year at the French Farmhouse 

 

Purchase links

French Village Diaries is a participant in the Amazon EU Associates Programme, an affiliate advertising programme designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.co.uk at no extra cost to you.

 

Amazon UK link 

 

Gillian Harvey

About the author

Internationally best-selling author of contemporary, emotionally compelling and humorous commercial fiction.

 

Social media

Facebook 

Twitter 

Instagram 

TikTok 

Newsletter Sign Up 

Bookbub profile 

 

 

The Bordeaux Book Club by Gillian Harvey

 

Book review The Last Day in Paris by Suzanne Kelman

The Last Day in Paris by Suzanne Kelman

The Last Day in Paris by Suzanne Kelman

 

“No, Mama, please don’t make me leave!” Sophie cries, clutching her teddy bear as her blue eyes fill with tears. “I’d rather be here in Paris with you, than far away somewhere safe…”

Paris, 1940: All over Paris, families are being pulled from their beds in the middle of the night. And ever since her husband was shot in cold blood, Brigitte Goldstein has known she is running out of time. She and her daughter Sophie are Jewish, so it won’t be long until the Nazis bang on their door.

But before she leaves, Brigitte must find her beloved husband’s painting, which was seized by the Nazis. She desperately hopes that if she saves it from destruction, then a piece of him will live on forever. And perhaps one day her daughter will uncover her father’s legacy, and the secret hidden inside…

Working in a museum under a false identity is Brigitte’s only hope. Until she meets Isabelle Valette, who confides in hushed tones that she is part of the Resistance. And when her new friend tells her of a train leaving Paris that can take children to safety, Brigitte knows her daughter must be on it, even if it breaks her heart.

But getting Sophie onto the train is dangerous. If they are caught smuggling a Jewish child out of Paris, they will be killed. And with the enemy closing in, can Brigitte get her beloved daughter to safety before it is too late?

The first utterly gripping novel in the Paris Sisters series, this is the story of two brave women and a secret that will tie them together forever, as the Second World War rages around them. Perfect for fans of Roberta Kagan, Kristin Hannah, and Fiona Valpy. 

The Last Day in Paris by Suzanne Kelman

My Review

This is an engaging dual timeline book following three women coping with life during the Occupation in Paris, as well as Esther, a struggling single mother in 2010. 

 

It was Esther and her story that I was immediately drawn to. Her mother, Sophie, was so traumatised by her early years in Paris, she never shared her family’s story with her daughter. Now suffering from dementia, Esther feared it was too late to get her mother’s help in piecing together the mystery that is suddenly thrown to her from Paris. With every trip to Paris filling her with positivity, her ex-husband’s negative behaviour threatened to engulf her once more, but the more she learned about her grandmother Brigitte’s strength and courage during the Occupation the stronger she became. It was a real pleasure seeing her evolve and flourish.

The Last Day in Paris by Suzanne Kelman

 

The Louvre, under Nazi rule, ceased to be the haven Isabelle Valette had come to love. Forced to catalogue artworks acquired by the Germans, she was determined to do all she could to save the art they were looting and destroying. Working alongside Isabelle were Brigitte and Marina. Brigitte, Esther’s grandmother, was driven to do whatever was necessary to save her husband’s greatest work of art and persevere his memory for her young daughter Sophie. A Jewish woman working among the Nazi’s, she risked her life for her mission and her story was an incredibly emotional one. Marina was used to hard knocks and had developed her own way of surviving life. She was far more mysterious than the other two, but her calculated risks posed a real danger to Isabelle and Brigitte. It was a tense and secretive atmosphere, as all three women had their own agendas and hidden pasts. All of them aware that trust in times of war was something that must be guarded and could cost you dearly. 

 

As we followed Isabelle, we got little introductions to her family life and her other sisters. We gained insights to their lives during the war and I’m looking forward to reading about the challenges faced by one of the other girls in the next book in the Paris Sisters series. I am also hoping that Esther’s story too might continue as this series plays out.

 

This is one for all of you who enjoy emotional, gritty novels set during the Occupation.

Purchase links

French Village Diaries is a participant in the Amazon EU Associates Programme, an affiliate advertising programme designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.co.uk at no extra cost to you.

 

Amazon UK purchase link 

 

Suzanne Kelman

 

About the author

Suzanne Kelman is a 2015 Academy of Motion Pictures Nicholl Finalist, Multi-Award-Winning Screenwriter and a Film Producer. As well as working in film she is also an International Amazon Bestselling Fiction Author of the Southlea Bay Series – The Rejected Writers’ Book Club, Rejected Writers Take the Stage and The Rejected Writers’ Christmas Wedding. Born in the United Kingdom, she now resides in Washington State.

 

Social media

Website 

Facebook 

Instagram 

X Twitter 

 

Sign up here to be the first to hear about new releases from Suzanne Kelman 

 

You can sign up here for all the best Bookouture deals you'll love 

 

There is also a short story from Suzanne Kelman, The Paris Orphans, that is currently available for FREE on Kindle. This prequel to The Paris Sisters series of novels, introduces us to the characters and sets the scene nicely. I started my adventure with this book, which is an incredibly moving and emotional read that stayed with me throughout The Last Day in Paris.

French-themed reading bingo

This year I’ve set myself a reading challenge bingo, with twenty-five different types of French themed books to tick off. This book nicely ticks off “A book set in Paris”.

 

French themed reading bingo challenge