Christmas at the Chocolate Pot Café by Jessica Redland
Published: 10th November 2018
Publisher: Little Bear Publishing
Pages: 187
Available on Kindle
Rating: 5/5
Blurb
A few minutes of courage
might change your life…
Emotionally, Tara Porter
finds the festive period a challenge. Christmas Day is a reminder of the family
she lost, and New Year’s Eve holds bitter memories of the biggest mistake of
her life: marrying Garth Tewkesbury. Shunning invitations to celebrate, she
seeks refuge in her flat with only her giant house bunny, Hercules, for
company.
Professionally, though,
it’s the best time of year. Tara’s thriving café, The Chocolate Pot, is always
packed. With the café hosting a wedding and engagement party, it’s shaping up
to be the café’s best Christmas ever.
When former nemesis, Jed
Ferguson, threatens the future of The Chocolate Pot, Tara prepares for a fight.
The café is everything to her and she’s not going to let anyone or anything
jeopardise that.
Tara badly misjudged ex-husband
Garth and, since then, has refused to let anyone in. After all, if you don’t
let them in, they can’t hurt you. But has she misjudged Jed too? Is it possible
that he’s not the arrogant, deceitful man from whom she bought the café 14 years
earlier? Can she find the courage to find out for sure?
Review
After reading Jessica Redland’s first Christmas book this
year Callie’s Christmas Wish I was really looking forward to reading Christmas
at the Chocolate Pot Café in the hopes of Callie and Maria’s story evolving.
They do appear in Christmas at the Chocolate Pot Café but the story is set five
years on, so I feel a lot of wonderful story-telling potential has been missed.
I soon got over my initial disappointment once I began Tara’s
story. Tara Potter has been the owner of The Chocolate Pot Café for over fourteen
years and has led a very sheltered life in Whitsborough Bay hoping her past
life won’t catch up with her. With her customers she’s the perfect café owner,
warm, hospitable and nothing is too much trouble for Tara to help with. Here
personal life is a different story, she lives alone and hasn’t formed any close
bonds with anyone in the town, except maybe her assistant manager Maria who she
longs to see happy again. As Tara spends yet another Christmas alone, she
decides maybe its time to step out of her comfort zone and start to let people
into her life again. But just as Tara starts to reach to people her old advisory
Jed Ferguson returns to the Bay and threatens the café’s livelihood, can Tara
be strong enough to confront him about his cheating ways all those years ago
and finally let her demons rest.
I really loved The Chocolate Pot Café, Tara’s story is a
great one and has some very unexpected twists which kept me hooked on reading
this. This is a book which covers betrayal, grief, loss, and at times is quite
a sad tale, this is perfectly balanced out though with Jessica Redland’s wonderful
heart-warming writing. The addition of Maria’s wedding adds extra romance and
there is plenty of community spirit which was a lovely to read about.
I can’t wait to read more from Jessica Redland as her story’s
totally absorb me and leave me wanting more everytime.
About the Author
Jessica had never considered writing as a
career until a former manager kept telling her that her business reports read
more like stories and she should write a book. She loved writing but had no
plot ideas. Then something happened to her that prompted the premise for her
debut novel, Searching for Steven.
She put fingers to keyboard and soon realised she had a trilogy and a novella.
She lives on the stunning North Yorkshire
Coast — the inspiration for the settings in her books — with her husband,
daughter, cat, Sprocker Spaniel, and an ever-growing collection of collectible
teddy bears. Although if the dog has her way, the collection will be reduced to
a pile of stuffing and chewed limbs!
Her passion for North Yorkshire is shared by
fellow-writer and great friend, Sharon Booth and, together, they are the
Yorkshire Rose Writers.
Jessica tries to balance her time — often
unsuccessfully — between being an HR tutor, trying to re-learn how to play the
piano, studying towards a Masters in Creative Writing, and writing itself. Who
needs sleep?
Social Media Links –
Twitter: @JessicaRedland
Website and blog: www.jessicaredland.com
Purchase Links
Thank you so much for the lovely review. I had a momentary panic with your opening line that you weren't going to have enjoyed it, so was very relieved and thrilled to see that Tara hooked you in. Really appreciate your kind words xx
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