Abby Clements

Having read and enjoyed Meet Me Under the Mistletoe last Christmas, and being a fan of foodie novels like Jenny Colgan's Meet Me at the Cupcake Cafe, I was well chuffed when my blogger friend Katie offered to send me her copy of Vivien's Heavenly Ice Cream Shop over the summer. The cover is GORGEOUS - very much like the Jenny Colgan ones, in fact - and happily the contents were delectable as well!

It's about two chalk 'n' cheese sisters, homebird Anna and eager traveller Imogen, who show more unexpectedly inherit their grandmother Vivien's ice cream shop on the Brighton seafront when she passes away. With Vivien's legacy to inspire them - though it's been a while since the shop did more than break even - they take the plunge and try to make a go of things. After revamping the interior and renaming it after its feisty late owner, food lover Anna flies out to Italy to learn the art of professional ice cream and sorbet-making while Imogen takes the reins at home in Brighton. Of course, all is not smooth sailing. Mishaps and crises ensue, both girls' love lives get dragged across the rocks, family tensions are at an all-time high, and Imogen is still feeling the tug to return abroad to continue following her passion for underwater photography. Meanwhile someone in Brighton seems to be out to sabotage their efforts before Vivien's can even get off the ground...

To be honest, I wasn't expecting much more than some fluffy entertainment to pass a day or two - but I absolutely LOVED this book. I think the various settings helped: Vivien's is on the seafront in Brighton, Anna travels to Florence for her course, Imogen has been living on a Thai island, and later she goes to the Glastonbury festival as well. All the different flavours of summer and holidays and the beach and music and sunshine, all rolled into one! Between the interesting locations, the ice cream and the budding romances, I closed the book with a happy sigh on my lips, feeling all sunny and contented.

The only thing I noticed that annoyed me a bit was the fact that the characters do a lot of 'recalling' - not just 'remembering' or 'thinking about' - which sounds very awkward and feels like a bit of a lazy way of filling in back story. It's been a while since I read Meet Me Under the Mistletoe but I think Clements did the same thing in that one. It's less jarring here, but I still noticed it! I also noticed a couple of editorial errors - at one point Clements mixes up the Italian names of Anna's landlady and her course tutor, and later she mentions Vivien's husband Joseph when previously she'd called him Stanley. Those mistakes were glaringly obvious and really should have been spotted during the editing process - but likewise, they can be easily fixed.

As a business owner (technically) I really appreciated the realistic business side of this particular book - something I had a slight issue with in Meet Me at the Cupcake Cafe. Anna and Imogen have some money from their grandmother to help them with their start-up costs, but they soon get through it and unlike Issy's cupcake cafe, they don't seem magically able to invest in expensive events and hire extra staff within months. They have to do the hard graft themselves, and have a real struggle on their hands to get the shop off the ground and onto the radar of locals and visitors alike - perhaps that was what helped make the story so compelling. It was a much more honest look at the experience of opening a shop, and although of course Vivien's flourishes by the end of the novel, I really appreciated the fact that Clements didn't make things too easy for her characters!

All in all, this was a really sunny, bright and delicious slice of summer fiction that MIGHT even have toppled Sophie Kinsella's The Undomestic Goddess off its top spot as my go-to book when I need to bury myself in something lively, inspiring and generally fuelled by sugar and spice and all things nice. Five stars, and I'll definitely be keeping it - along with Katie's Penguin postcard - ready for next time I need cheering up!

BONUS POINTS: for the now-standard recipes in the back of the book, which include a classic vanilla ice cream and a delicious-sounding salted caramel that I'm determined to make my stepdad try out sometime! show less

I'd originally bought this novel to read on the run-up to Christmas, but I didn't finish my previous book in time! So I read it over the New Year period instead, which suited me just fine. It's a lovely girlie festive read about two friends - country housewife Rachel and glamorous fashion designer Laurie - who end up house-swapping in the run-up to Christmas after Rachel's mother-in-law has to go for urgent medical treatment in London. Friendly Rachel, of course, blossoms in the city even as show more she struggles to keep her family together, while workaholic Laurie begins to reassess her priorities in her friend's little Yorkshire cottage. Sure, it's not the most spectacularly-written book I've ever read, but there's a dash of romance, plenty of quirky characters, some tear-jerking moments, an unexpected twist, and plenty of Christmas spirit, and I loved it! show less

Short but a lovely, heart-warming Christmas story about a village having a bake off style competition. There wasn't a lot to get my teeth into but actually I really enjoyed it. The author managed to give enough information about her characters for me to be really pleased by the ending which is no mean feat in somebody who is not usually into short stories. Really nice and made me put another of this writer's books on my wish list.

Meet Me Under the Mistletoe is about two estranged, but once very close, friends who decide to do a house swap near Christmas.

Laurie is a city girl, living in a flat in London with a very successful career that takes up all of her time. She’s trying to recover from a failed romance that didn’t work out because of her extreme dedication to her work. When things at work take a bad turn for her, she feels like everything is falling apart. She desperately wants to run away and hide.

Rachel is show more a stay-at-home mom who lives in a cottage in Yorkshire with her husband, Aiden, and two children, fifteen year old Milly and her younger brother Zak. She is happy taking care of the kids and the house, cooking and baking, and spending time with her mother-in-law, Bea. When Bea starts having health problems and it looks like she will need to go to the hospital in London, Rachel and the rest of the family want to go with her. Rachel contacts Laurie and Laurie is only too glad to agree to a house swap since it offers her a chance to disappear to a place no one would expect her to go…the country.

Laurie arrives in Yorkshire and quickly realizes adapting to the country life might be harder than she expected. Rachel and her family are overwhelmed by the speed of London. They’re used to the quiet of the country and they find London to be noisy and full of people rushing to get here and there.
Will Laurie survive the country life? Will she ever learn how to use an Aga? Can Rachel hold her family together as her husband becomes more distracted and aloof, and her daughter becomes more and more secretive?
Read the book to find out. I write no spoiler reviews.

I really liked Meet Me Under the Mistletoe. It was a fun and interesting read with a few unexpected surprises thrown in. I liked the characters and felt they were well-developed, even the secondary characters. Meet Me Under the Mistletoe also did a good job at putting me in the holiday mood. I was pulling for things to work out for everybody. I’ve had some bad luck with holiday-themed books in the past, but I’m happy to say I was really pleased with this one. The ending was great and the pace was good throughout the book. It took me a while to read it, but that’s my own fault because I’ve been pretty distracted this week. The only part of the book that I had a problem with was Millie’s love interest. Who he turned out to be really surprised me, and it seemed a little far-fetched that things worked out the way they did. Otherwise, I felt it was pretty true-to-life. You can find someone to identify with whether you are single or married. Love is definitely a theme, but the single life and trying to find the right person is also. I highly recommend Meet Me Under the Mistletoe to get you into the Christmas spirit. I’d give it five stars, but I do feel like I should go a little lower due to the odd way Millie’s love interest worked out. Read it before Christmas, you won’t regret it!
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