Want to add a little zest to your life? JUST ADD SPICE! Out now!
Today
I have the absolute pleasure of hosting fabulous best-selling Novelist Carol E. Wyer! Carol is bringing us
her brand new, hilarious book:
Just Add Spice
Dawn
Ellis needs to escape from her painfully dull existence. Her unemployed husband
spends all day complaining about life, moping around, or fixing lawnmowers on
her kitchen table.
The
local writing class proves to be an adequate distraction with its eccentric
collection of wannabe authors and, of course, the enigmatic Jason, who soon
shows a romantic interest in her.
Dawn
pours her inner frustrations into her first novel about the extraordinary
exploits of Cinnamon Knight, an avenging angel -- a woman who doesn’t believe
in following the rules. Cinnamon is ruthless and wanton, inflicting suffering
on any man who warrants it.
Little
does Dawn realise that soon the line between reality and fiction will blur. Her
own life will be transformed, and those close to her will pay the price.
Extract:
Cinnamon
Knight ground the stub of her Benson and Hedges’ cigarette into the pavement
with the heel of her Prada leather motorcycle boot, where it now joined a small
pile of tab ends. Strategically placed in a shop doorway, she watched the top
left window of a block of flats opposite. She had been there almost two hours.
Rain beat steadily on the pavement, drumming against the gutter with constant
thuds, but this did not deter her. Her patience was rewarded as the light
blazing from the window was finally extinguished. She sauntered across the road
to the BMW parked in front of the block of flats along the kerbside, sandwiched
between a Peugeot 205 and a C Class Mercedes.
Dressed
completely in black, face partially obscured by her North Face hooded jacket;
she was almost invisible next to the dark car. It took only a minute to fiddle
with the lock, open the door, and slide into the car. She lowered herself down
in the driver’s seat, casting a cursory glance out of the window. The streets
were empty. The weather was on her side and no one was braving the downpour,
not even the old man at the end of the road who rarely missed taking his dog
out for an evening stroll.
She
leant forward and pulled off the cover below the steering wheel with one deft
movement. Extracting the screwdriver from a neat case, she stabbed it into the
ignition lock. A quick fiddle, one sharp twist, and the car burst into life;
the persistent thudding of the rain against the pavement hid the initial
coughing of the engine. She pulled away from the kerb swiftly and headed up the
road at speed.
Pushing
the hood away from her head, she checked her face in the rear-view mirror.
That’ll teach him to mess about with women, she thought. No one, but no one,
messes about with Cinnamon—the rat!
MY REVIEW
MY REVIEW
When I first got the gist of the plot, the lines between reality
and fiction blurring, the leading lady’s heroine in a novel becoming so real
she takes on a persona of her own, so much so, we read the story also from her
POV, I wondered, whether the author could pull it off? She did. Oh, how she
did. I was totally convinced, drawn straight in and eager to follow ‘both’ leading
ladies stories. When you find yourself thinking, well, if Dawn can do it, I
can, you have empathised, completely. The story has fabulous chuckle moments
you can’t fail to identify with. The ‘which animal in bed’ line had me laughing
out loud – in public. The dilemma about whether to dice up a certain sexual
enhancement aid for fear of… Well, I’m saying no more for fear of spoilers.
This is a tongue in cheek story, but with real poignancy. Reader or writer,
we’re looking for escapism, but also for characters we can identify with. Carol
gives us that, in buckets. The supporting cast (the characters in the writing
group are all fabulously drawn, recognisable people the heroine can feed off, particularly
one. My lips are sealed). Overall, this is a story about growth, about it never
being too late to try to grow, not just aspire to – and it comes to a very
satisfactory conclusion. The ending was all I wanted it to be, for two certain
ladies. Here’s to Cinnamon (loved the Jessica analogy). To Dawn.
Note: Carol is a fellow author at Safkhet Publishing. As a
best-selling author she was on my ‘must-read’ list with her previous books
before she became so. My review is therefore my honest opinion of a highly
entertaining read.
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