Jill Mansell - Promise Me
4⭐
Genre: Contemporary Fiction, Romance, Fiction, Contemporary Romance
Pages: 400
Format: Paperback Proof
Publisher: Headline Books
Date Published: 19th January 2023
Huge thank you to Headline Books for sending me a proof copy of this book to read and review.
Book Blurb:
'Jill Mansell is the queen of feelgood romance' Sunday Express
One minute Lou is happily employed, with a perfect flat. The next, her home and job have gone. Suddenly she has to start over.
The last thing Lou wants is to move to a tiny Cotswolds village. She certainly doesn't intend to work for curmudgeonly eighty-year-old Edgar Allsopp. But Edgar is about to make her the kind of promise nobody could ignore. In return, she secretly vows to help him fall in love with life again.
Foxwell is also home to Remy, whose charm and charisma are proving hard to ignore. But Lou hasn't recovered from the last time she fell for a charmer. She needs a distraction - and luckily one's about to turn up.
Secrets never stay hidden for long in Foxwell, nor are promises always kept. And no one could guess what lies ahead...
My Review:
This was my first ever Jill
Mansell book and I thoroughly enjoyed it. For me, it was a very feel-good and
cosy read about a small town and its inhabitants, and it is set in Cotswold,
which I am very familiar with. It is also quite a slow-paced book, but with
that reader gets to know each of the characters quite well. There were quite a
lot of laugh-out-loud and very heart-warming moments, too. Although, I did wish
there was more romance in this book, since at first, just by reading the blurb
I thought is it more of a romance than anything else.
The story follows Lou, who one
day is happy in her favourite job, yet next day she is unemployed and with nowhere
to stay. However, one weekend whilst visiting her childhood friend in a small
village in Cotswold, she meets a grumpy old man named Edgar, who straight away
wants Lou to become his live-in helper. As Lou moves into a quiet, yet very
friendly village, she also realises that she is starting to catch feelings for
her childhood friend’s brother, but is she ready to open her heart to someone
new, or are the scars from her past still too raw?
This book has so many likeable and
well-written characters, but even Edgar, no matter how grumpy, was still a very
lovable and relatable character. I personally adored Captain Oaks and loved how
much Lou and Remy grew as people throughout this book. There were characters I
loved and hated in this book, but in the end, I could relate to and understand
where each of them was coming from when it came to their personal intentions, choices
and actions.
The writing was brilliant and I liked
the change in POVs throughout the chapters, giving a glimpse into different
characters in this book, especially displaying her intentions and personalities.
Mansell had a perfect balance of heart-warming, funny, hilarious and sad moments,
with some of the more awful characters being somewhat redeemed at the end of
the book. I just wished there was more romance in this book, I wanted more of Lou
and Remy and their love.
Overall: Cosy, easy and very feel-good
read set in a small village with a set of relatable, flawed, but likeable (for
the most part) characters. Quick read and I will be reading more of Jill
Mansell’s books in the future.
About the Author:
Jill Mansell lives with her partner and children in Bristol and writes full-time. Actually, that’s not true; she watches TV, eats fruit gums, admires the rugby players training in the sports field behind her house, and spends hours on the internet marvelling at how many other writers have blogs. Only when she’s completely run out of displacement activities does she write.
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