take a chance


Sarah Webb - 2005
    Gemma Redden, aka Agnetha, has just broken her ankle and finding a new singer to fill her white platform boots at such late notice isnt going to be easy. Desperate times call for desperate measures and the youngest Redden sister, Mia, reluctantly agrees to don the blonde wig and sky-blue hot pants. For Mia, a shy piano teacher who has felt third best all her life, this is her big chance to prove herself to her two big sisters, Wendy and Gemma. Meanwhile, Mias oldest friend, Alva Ryan, is having a life crisis of her own. Her previously devoted boyfriend, Sean, has just walked out, and this time hes not coming back. Things come to a head when Wendy has a terrible accident. Because Wendy has been keeping a secret; a secret that could blow the band apart and devastate the close-knit Redden sisters. But secrets have a way of coming out when you least expect them to. And sometimes even the best of sisters gets it horribly wrong.

Always on my mind


Colette Caddle - 2011
    Her sister Laura has all the arrangements firmly in hand, from the designer dresses to the prestigious venue; and if Molly would have been happier with something a little more low-key, she can hardly complain. She's got everything she ever wanted: her perfect job, as an agony aunt for online magazine Teenage Kix; Declan, the love of her life; and, in Belle, Oliver, Rory and Laura, a loving and warm, if slightly eccentric family. Then Declan drops his bombshell: he has to go abroad, on business. The wedding must be postponed. Hurt, and reeling from the shock, Molly is seeing Declan off at the airport when she bumps into Luke Fortune. Luke, her childhood sweetheart, left the country when they were both eighteen. It's been almost twelve years, and Molly thought she had moved on. But, seeing Luke again, she realises that she has a window of opportunity, while Declan is away, to put a few of the ghosts in her past to rest.

Sapphire


Katie Price - 2009
    Things start to go wrong at the hen party of one of Sapphire’s friends – who just happens to be one of the nation’s favourite celebrities. Will Sapphire be able to save the day and in doing so, her business?

Grown Ups


Marian Keyes - 2020
    And they're a happy family. Johnny's wife, Jessie - who has the most money - insists on it.Under the surface, though, conditions are murkier. While some people clash, other people like each other far too much . . .Everything stays under control until Ed's wife Cara, gets concussion and can't keep her thoughts to herself. One careless remark at Johnny's birthday party, with the entire family present, starts Cara spilling out all their secrets.In the subsequent unravelling, every one of the adults finds themselves wondering if it's time - finally - to grow up?

Getting Mad, Getting Even


Annie Sanders - 2009
    Their agency, Domestic Angels, provides invaluable help to armies of harassed women. After years of hard work, Georgie and Flick have built a small but grateful clientele - doing everything from booking the plumber to replacing dead hamsters.Then one evening, they are visited by a pale, nervous-looking woman who makes the strangest request yet. Her husband has combined a takeover with a leg-over. Would Georgie and Flick help her get her own back? It isn't long before word gets out. Inundated with requests from angry wives, Georgie and Flick begin to wonder whether all these men are really as black as they are painted.Meanwhile, the disgruntled husband of a client has rumbled them. It may be that they aren't the only masters of revenge after all...

Two For Joy


Patricia Scanlan - 2001
    Not any more! But there is one nagging doubt: does Oliver REALLY love her? Would he have married her if she hadn't done the proposing herself?Cora Flynn, Oliver's bitter mother, has boycotted the wedding. She is determined that her detested new daughter-in-law will not become the number one woman in her son's life.Wedding guest Lorna Morgan can't wait to shake the dust of Kilronan off her shoes. She's destined for bright city lights, unlike her stick-in-the-mud cousin, Heather Williams, who was only invited to the 'afters' with her clodhopper boyfriend, Neil. But then, in Lorna's eyes, Heather's just an 'afters' sort of person and always will be.But worms turn, and what a difference a year makes. In Dublin, London and New York there is no respite for Noreen, Lorna or Heather. Only in Kilronan can the Pandora's box that was opened at Oliver Flynn's wedding finally be closed.

Stately Pursuits


Katie Fforde - 1997
    Hetty doesn't mind; at least she can be miserable in private. But 'private' is a relative term in a village which revolves around the big house. Particularly when you are expected to thwart Great Uncle Samuel's awful heir, and his nefarious plans for his inheritance.Pitchforked into the community's fight to save the manor, Hetty has no time to wallow. And once she has shared her troubles with one neighbour (Caroline: a very understanding shoulder, despite her glamorous appearance and impossibly long legs), and cast an appreciative eye over another (Peter: equally long-legged, but offering rather more practical help), she wonders if her heart is irretrievably broken after all...

Shoe Addicts Anonymous


Beth Harbison - 2007
    Lorna Rafferty is up to her eyeballs in debt and can't stop her addiction to Ebay. Sandra Vanderslice, battling agoraphobia, pays her shoe bills by working as a phone sex operator. And Jocelyn Bowen is a nanny for the family from hell (who barely knows a sole from a heel but who will do anything to get out of the house).  On Tuesday nights, these women meet to trade shoes, and, in the process, form friendships that will help them each triumph over their problems—from secret pasts to blackmail, bankruptcy, and dating.  Funny, emotional, and powerful, Shoe Addicts Anonymous is the perfect read for any woman who has ever struggled to find the perfect fit.

Wild and Free


Wendy Holden - 2015
    Everyone piles through its gates - and Cupid lies in wait to sprinkle a little midsummer madness on them all.Teacher Ginnie is desperate to forget her crush on headmaster Mark, and hopes glamping might do the trick. But Mark is also heading for Wild & Free to reform his college band ... desperate not to be seen by anyone he knows. Mark's bandmate James dreams of a festival blow-out with his son, Guy ... until his wife Victoria's ambition kills the dream. Now she and Guy are en route to Wild & Free instead but when Guy meets Shanna-Mae and falls for her earthy charms, Victoria is determined to snap Cupid's arrow.Will the magic of the festival send them wild? Or set them free to find peace and love?

The Matchbreaker


Chris Manby - 2006
     Thrilled isn't the word for how Lindsey Parker feels when her widowed father announces his plans to marry his personal trainer, Karen. The devoted daddy's girl has already scared off three former fiancŽes, and the new one's got to go too-if for no other reason than her appalling taste in bridesmaids' gowns. Lindsey's driven to do something pretty drastic, and nearly manages to kill Karen. Fortunately, while her botched attempt at homicide fails, it does succeed in driving Karen away-along with her hideous velour tracksuits. The trouble is, Dad is genuinely crushed. Now, with a change of heart, Lindsey's on the road to something close to redemption.

The Grand Finale


Janet Evanovich - 1988
    She writes "high speed comic mayhem" (Detroit Free Press); she's "a blast of fresh air" (Washington Post); "side-splitting funny" (Publishers Weekly) and "a winner" (Glamour). In other words, she's Janet Evanovich.Berry Knudson had a talent for disaster, but when she climbed a tree to rescue a kitten, she wasn't prepared for the scrumptious hunk undressing in a nearby window, or her dive downward that smashed Jake Sawyer's pizza and won his heart! But was there room in her chaotic schedule for a risk-taking inventor with dreams? She took classes, delivered pizzas, and cared for three eccentric old ladies she rescued from the train station. But Jake thrived on a challenge, and he could be very inventive. Could he teach her there was time to make butterscotch pudding and let herself be loved?

He Loves Me Not...He Loves Me


Claudia Carroll - 2004
    Disaster strikes when their father abandons the family, cleaning them out of the little cash they had managed to hold on to. But a ray of hope appears when Steve Sullivan, an old family friend and confirmed bachelor, suggests that they allow the hall to be used as the location for a major new movie.So Davenport Hall is taken over by the crème de la crème, including the self-centred Montana Jones, fresh out of rehab and anxious to kick-start her career, and Guy van der Post, a major sex symbol with an eye for Daisy. Throw in Ella Hepburn, Hollywood royalty and living legend, and soon there's more sex and drama off-camera than on!And Portia, who'd completely given up on love, is in for quite a surprise...

Drop Dead Gorgeous


Katie Agnew - 2003
    She's young, pretty and she has a fabulous job on a glossy magazine, which involves interviewing celebrities (and air-brushing their personalities). But when she is offered a job presenting a trendy Friday night television show she can't resist the opportunity to experience fame first hand. Putting her puritanical Scottish upbringing, her intellectual boyfriend and her hippy best friend behind her, she soon hooks up with world-famous actress Lucy Lloyd and gorgeous, infamous rock god Ricky Jones, who introduce her to a hedonistic world of partying where appearance is everything and nothing really matters but sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll. But as the stories about her private life become front page news, Laura begins to doubt those closest to her, and her life starts to spiral dangerously out of control. Packed with passion, glamour and danger, DROP DEAD GORGEOUS is a unmissable glimpse into the fame game - and the price you have to pay to play it.

The Reading Group


Elizabeth Noble - 2003
    Over the course of a year, each of these women’s lives becomes intertwined, both through the books they read and the real-life stories they tell.Inspired by a shared desire for conversation, a good book and a glass of wine, Clare, Harriet, Nicole, Polly and Susan undergo startling revelations and transformations despite their difference in background, age and respective dilemmas.In The Reading Group, Noble reveals the many complicated paths in life we all face as well as the power and importance of friendship.

I Don't Know How She Does It


Allison Pearson - 2001
    But when she finds herself awake at 1:37 a.m. in a panic over the need to produce a homemade pie for her daughter's school, she has to admit her life has become unrecognizable. With panache, wisdom, and uproarious wit, I Don't Know How She Does It brilliantly dramatizes the dilemma of every working mom.