Thursday, June 3, 2010

Love Letters - Katie Fforde


Laura Horsely lives a contented if drab life and would rather read a good book than do anything else. I could understand that about Laura; while I am nowhere near as people shy as Laura is, I frequently have moments when I happily forego the company of anyone in favour of a good book. Laura's life is an ordered one and she prefers to keep it that way, but she is thrown for a loop when Henry, the owner of the bookstore where she works decides to close. What will Laura do for a living? Enter Eleanora, super-agent and a giant of the literary world whom Laura meets at a book lauch at the store. Eleanora is taken with Laura and her vast knowledge of books and ropes her in as a volunteer for a literary festival hosted by her niece, deep in the English country side. Laura arrives there with bag, baggage and trepedition only to find herself among people who will become fast friends and with whom she feels terrific kinship. But Laura's ordered life is about to disrupted by Dermot Flynn, considered to be the greatest living Irish author (and Laura's favourite) who is as prickly and eccentric as they come. Laura is charged with the responsibility of hot-footing it to Ireland and bringing him to the festival: Dermot Flynn who has has had the worst case of writer's block for previous fifteen years, who has barricaded himself up in his village ready to bite anyone who dares to draw him out and Dermot Flynn who looks devilishly handsome. And when Dermot sees Laura, he is hell bent on having her. What does Laura do? Especially when she herself has an almighty crush on him?

Katie Fforde's Love Letters has everything I look for in a good chick lit. and I loved this book for many reasons: it was first and foremost about books and I enjoyed the bits about the literary festival immensely and descriptions of the Irish country side, I devoured because I have longed to go to Ireland for years now. I loved how Laura went from shy and colourless to fun and full of life and Dermot Flynn, well, hottie extraordinaire! I loved how Eleanora describes him: "When I saw him for the first time I thought, Darcy eat your heart out!" Dermot proved to be the perfect foil for Laura and theirs is a romance I had a riot reading about and so will you. Katie Fforde's Love Letters could be the perfect pick-me-up on a bad day, a book to while away your time with when you are bored, or simply just because.

7 comments:

Kals said...

Someone who makes Darcy eat his heart out ey? I'm definitely in for reading the book. It sounds charming and I adore chick-lit set in England :)

Bhargavi said...

I hear you when you say that at times you would like nothing more than to curl up with a book.. sounds like a fun book,though i cant imagine anyone being competition to darcy !

Vaishnavi said...

@Kals - Lol personally, NO ONE be compared with Darcy but according to Eleanora, Dermot is THAT good ;) He was fun to read about though! Even I adore chick-lit set in England, I have no idea why but I do!

@Bedazzled - Yep, don't we all! :) And even I feel nobody can compare wit Darcy.

Kals said...

Hehe, true! The idea of England in my head is replete with images of greenery, gorgeous countryside, books, Austen and gentlemen with hot accents :P

Probably why I adore chick-lit set in England ^_^

Vaishnavi said...

@Kals - I sort of agree with you on that. That is a primary reason why I adore Katie Fforde

Pavi said...

Firstly,the book's cover is what dragged me into readin this:):) It looks super -stylish..Also about the chick-lit in england,I absolutely love it too..Its completely different from chick-lits set in the U.S..Though they're good reads,there's always a feeling of emptiness that I've been left with once i finish reading.But the ones set in England,ABSOLUTELY Classy!! this one sounds like it too.. Nice post sweetie:)gave a soothing review:)

Vaishnavi said...

Pavi - I will lend you this one and any other Fforde that I can lay my hands on :)