Sunday 8 May 2011

The Happy Home for Broken Hearts by Rowan Coleman

Rowan Coleman is an Author who I had not come across before. I was surprised when I googled the author to find that she has had many books published which I have not seen or heard of before. The front cover is your typical chick-lit style book which is what grabs us chick-lit lovers straight to it on the shelf.

Plot
Ellie has hit rock bottom. After losing her husband in a car crash she finds herself unable to leave the house, and in a serious amount of debt. Ellen needs to find a way to bring in the money to keep a roof over her and her son Charlie's head. Ellen's sister comes up with the idea of renting out the spare rooms of the house. A real mix of people came to rent the house an old lady Allegra who is an author, sexy Sabine who works with Ellen's sister and Matt a writer for a lad's magazine. Each of the new tenants bring with them the problems with their lives. With many secrets and twists and turns in the book will they all be able to help each other with the terrible mess they have made of their lives?

Characters
Ellen- Ellen is our main character in the book and from the first chapter I warmed to her. She is heavily grieving but at the same time she is trying to sort financial things out for her and her son. Through out the book we see Ellen's character grow and we as the reader hopes that she will be able to take steps to making her way back to happiness and more importantly to be able to leave the house giving her her life back.

Charlie- how can you not feel for this little boy. The poor lad has lost his father and now it feels like all to soon he is loosing his mother too. Charlie seems to be very wise and clued up for his age and he really cares about his mum and tries to help her to realise she has a problem. He has hit that point in a childs life where he has more questions but with his father not around he must be finding it very hard.
Hannah- This is the one character which I couldn't take to from the minute she appeared in the book. Hannah is Ellen's sister and I found that each time she cropped up I was wary of her
Matt- This guy is like an onion when you start to peel back the layers you find different parts to him. I have to say I loved his character. It was great to read the changes in his character.


My opinion

I have to say this now I really enjoyed this book. After reading this book I can not wait to get to the shops and hunt out another one of Rowan Coleman's books! This book had you gripped from the first chapter it was so hard to put down. I read the book in two days and when I finished I felt a little lost!!
The storyline stays on an even keel all the way through the book so at no time was there a part of the book which was low enough to make you feel like skipping a few paragraphs.

With a lot of the story being about grieving and broken hearts the story could have been quite depressing and challenging to read but Rowan Coleman cleverly put a light bit of banter here and there which helped to keep the book light hearted and enjoyable.

This book had everything you could want in a book, a touch of humour with a lot of emotion and a spoonful of romance!

I think I also found the book an enjoyable read as for a chick-lit book it was not farfetched which meant that you actually believed a lot of what you was reading was really going on which made you feel closer to the characters and hoping for the best for them.

I love the fact that the ending of this book was perfect. It did not feel rushed and it did not give too much away but gave us enough to answer all of the reader's questions there for not leaving us on a cliff hanger!
I would defiantly recommend this book and I would also say judging from this book Rowan Coleman is an author to look out for. I can only hope that her other books are just as good as The Happy Home for Broken Hearts. If you are looking for a well written chick-lit book this is defiantly one to give a go. Keep a look out in your shops over the next few months as I have heard there is also to be a new release from Rowan Coleman ;-)

More Information
ISBN 978 0 09 952522 6
www.rbooks.co.uk

also check out http://www.rowancoleman.co.uk/books-adult#book1rev iew this will give you a snippet from the book.

Look out for her other Adult books
Growing up Twice
After Ever After
River Deep
Woman Walks Into a Bar
The Accidental Mother
The Baby Group
The Accidental Wife
The Accidental Family.

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