Lucy Dickens - The Holiday Bookshop

Lucy Dickens - The Holiday Bookshop 

4⭐

Genre:  Romance, Contemporary Fiction, Fiction, Travel Reading, Women's Fiction

Pages:  416

Format: Paperback 

Publisher: Penguin Books 

Date Published: 21st July 2022 

Huge thank you to Penguin Books UK/ Cornerstone for sending me a copy of this book to read and review. 

Book Blurb: 

Role: Bookseller wanted! (3-month fixed-term contract)

Location: A luxury resort on the island of Bounty Cove Cay.

Skills required: The ideal candidate will have experience in a retail environment, preferably within the book industry.

Desired qualities: This role will appeal to a book lover with an adventurous streak who is looking for an escape from their everyday life.

What to expect: Sun, sea, and a bookshop that is far from thriving. No one said it would be smooth sailing.

Please note: You may fall in love with more than just our island along the way...

Looking for your next beach read? Look no further! Escape with The Holiday Bookshop, perfect for fans of Jo Thomas, Phillipa Ashley and Jenny Colgan.

My Review: 

I love stories that contain at least some of my favourite topics. The Holiday Bookshop had travelling, exotic settings and books! Yaay! It was also a very cute and relaxing summer read, that made me want to have a holiday in the Maldives instead of sitting in my back garden in a very gloomy England. Oh, and the dream to work in a bookshop just grew tenfold after reading this book, too.

The book is about two best friends Jenny and Marianne, who open a bookshop in a small coastal town in North Cornwall. They both have completely different personalities, with Marianne being a risk taker and Jenny being someone who only takes very calculated and well-thought steps in life. They both complement each other, whisht running the bookshop, with Marianne being responsible for event organisation and the social aspect of running a bookshop, whereas Jenny is more behind the scenes with spreadsheets, orders and organisation. Jenny wants to be more adventurous like Marianne but she also can’t leave her only stable thing in life, her bookshop. That’s until one day she stumbles across this advert for a 3-month contract in the Maldives to open and run a bookshop. She reluctantly applies and….Next thing she knows she is jetting off to the Maldives! However, that doesn’t come without consequences. Will Jenny lose her friendship with Marianne and will she lose a person she loves the most if she leaves her small town in Cornwall or will she find a new purpose in life in the exotic Maldives? What follows next is dual timelines of both Jenny and Marianne exploring their new lives without each other in different parts of the world…

This book is very quirky, and I think it is because of the very relatable writing. For example, Dickens mentions Love Island, popular music, social media, basically all the things that we as readers can relate to on a day-to-day basis. Quirkiness aside, I loved the holiday atmosphere, especially Jenny’s timeline in the Maldives. I mean, who doesn’t like exotic destinations and loads of books? I didn’t like Marianne’s storyline in Vegas as much, as I felt that most of the time, she just took risks and then blame destiny for everything going wrong. I didn’t mind it the first few times but at times she was a rather annoying character.

Although marketed as more of a romance book, both storylines, Jenny’s and Marianne’s are much more than that. They both grew as characters, explored their lives without each other, discovered their different skills and strengths, as well as learned so much about themselves as individuals. Jenny and Marianne needed a break from the very close friendship that they had had since a young age. Also, they both needed a change of scenery from their business venture that both started together a few years ago. Foremost, they needed to learn how to live without each other. I liked this side of the story since as a reader you see that as the book progresses both Marianne and Jenny grow as individuals, whilst exploring their personalities and dreams, realising that they need to be less reliant on each other as they used to be before.

I do wish this book had more romance in it because the setting and the premise of the book were so perfect for some more romance. I mean there was some romance in Marianne’s storyline but I felt that Jenny deserved some romance in the Maldives, too. Oh, and the ending was abrupt when it came to Jenny’s storyline. I wished there was more on how she got on with her love interest during the last few weeks in the Maldives and then after the Maldives.

Overall: Very cute and quirky summer romance, with the scenery that just relaxes you and makes you want to go on an exotic holiday to the Maldives. I liked the writing too, as it was relatable and made the book flow very well, capturing the perspectives, changes and growth of both main characters. If you are searching for a great summer read or just want a relaxing read that would take you to some exotic shores, then this book is definitely it. I can’t wait to read more books by Lucy Dickens, as I am definitely putting her other books on my TBR list. 

About the Author:

Lucy Dickens is the pseudonym for Lisa Dickenson. Lisa lives by the Devon seaside with her husband and one incredibly boisterous Bernese Mountain dog. She spends her days writing the kind of hilarious women’s fiction that sets the world to rights.

https://www.penguin.co.uk/authors/245417/lucy-dickens?tab=penguin-biography