Joe Cawley - More Ketchup than Salsa: Confessions of a Tenerife Barman (More Ketchup than Salsa #1)

 

Joe Cawley - More Ketchup than Salsa: Confessions of a Tenerife Barman (More Ketchup than Salsa #1)

 3.5 ⭐

Genre: Travel, Non-Fiction, True Story, Contemporary

Pages: 282

Format:  Kindle Book 

Favourite Quote: 'The downside of being a chameleon is that it soon becomes hard to remember your original colour. Personalities get lost, engulfed in a wave of adopted guises worn to please other people' (Page 185).

Book Blurb: 

Childhood sweethearts, Joe and Joy are broke and bored. They’re also tired of smelling of fish. When offered the chance to escape from the dreary market stalls of England to run a bar on a sub-tropical island, they recklessly jump at the opportunity - despite their spectacular lack of experience. In Tenerife, dreams of a better life overseas are soon crushed by mini-mafias, East European prostitutes and biblical-grade cockroach infestations. Joe and Joy's foreign fantasy turns into a nightmare as they find themselves trapped with a failing bar in a foreign land, pandering to a bar full of oddball expats while trying to stop their relationship crashing into the rocks. Can they save their business, their dreams, and their relationship before it's too late...

My Review: 

I kept seeing this book in the travel book section for a few years now and I finally decided to give it a go...Firstly, because I am fascinated by the Canary Islands and Tenerife, and secondly because it was my first read on Tenerife that wasn't related to my dissertation on volcanic hazards in Tenerife. 

Did I like this book? Yes, but not until the part where the author is actually in Tenerife. The beginning of the book for me was really slow and I even had to put the book down a few times. However, I read it through and it definitely got funnier. At times, hilarious and witty, exactly how I know British humour to be. Although, there were times when the author did try too much with jokes, including too many of them or forcing some when it was better left without one. 

I liked the story, the plot did not jump and it was very timeline like, so it felt like a diary to me, which was a fresh take on a book. 

There were some parts where one story abruptly ends and another one starts, so at the end, I did have a few questions on some of the characters in the book. 

This book definitely proved to me that what I thought about Brits abroad/on holiday is true, which made me interested to read more, thus I will read the next two instalments, too. 

Overall: I really liked this book, it was an easy travel read (after a slow beginning). The 3.5 stars for me is definitely for the slow beginning. Nevertheless, I learned a lot about Tenerife and business owners there by reading this story. 

I recommend this book to someone who wants a quick read about a life in a warm climate, who is interested in living abroad and who just wants a little bit of British humour.