Prompt: A book by an author who has written more than 20 books

There’s obviously loads of great writers that you can pick for this prompt. I scoured my TBR pile- which has of lTe turned into a trolley full of fantastic books picked something fitting. I chose A Country Escape by Katie Fforde. I picked it up in the summer at one of my Little Local Book Hub book swaps.

What it’s about?

Fran has always wanted to be a farmer. And now it looks as if her childhood dream is about to come true. She has just moved in to a beautiful but very run-down farm in the Cotswolds, currently owned by an old aunt who has told Fran that if she manages to turn the place around in a year, the farm will be hers. But Fran knows nothing about farming. She might even be afraid of cows.

She’s going to need a lot of help from her best friend Issi, and also from her wealthy and very eligible neighbour – who might just have his own reasons for being so supportive. Is it the farm he is interested in? Or Fran herself?

What I think:

This is light-hearted frothy romance.

Fran finds herself potentially inheriting a dairy farm in the Cotswolds so gives up her job as a London pub chef and dreams of opening her own restaurant to become a farmer.

This book wasn’t quite there for me. Fran wasn’t appealing enough. Her friendship and conversations with best-friend Issi was lacking something I can’t quite pit my finger on.

She was very quick to accept money from a virtual stranger and call on neighbour Anthony for help in every situation.

And she is obsessed with cheese.

Luckily distant cousin Amy has paid for someone to look after the cows because Fran shows very little interest in them.

The villains were also no where near dastardly enough. Australian Roy potential usurper of the farm inheritance is mainly rude and drunk. And scheming love rival Megan doesn’t actually do any scheming apart from criticising the cheese.

This is a nice enough book. Of course it ends happily – everyone ends up in love and all the cheese is a triumph. It’s a very quick read – switch the TV off and read it in the length of time you could watch a film.

If you want to A Country Escape of your own head to:

Waterstones: click here

Amazon.co.uk: click here