Wickham Hall by Cathy Bramley

I thoroughly enjoyed Holly's story in Wickham Hall and the author writes in such a way that you feel like you are getting the warmest of hugs from her as you read.  Like life nothing is ever straightforward and it isn't all happy, happy, joy, joy but it did suck me right in and I did not want to leave.

Our main protagonist is Holly - single, out of work and worried about her mother's hoarding habit - and she really could be the next person you pass in the street.  When she lands her dream job in event planning at the local Stately Home, the eponymous Wickham Hall, we get to see a tiny glimpse behind the scenes of the workings of the grand place that is both the home and livelihood for the family that inherited it.  From planning a grand wedding, through a summer fete and on to a Christmas function it is a heady rush of preparations and pinning a smile on.  Despitew all that she still finds time to have a private life that feels full and fairly realistic - lots of chilling with her best friend and a bottle or two of wine.

Of course there has to be a Grand Romance in a book of this type and we get two and a half for the price of one in this book.  Not only Holly's love for the heir to Wickham Hall but her mother's youthful indiscretion with a charming Italian who turns out to be Holly's father but her new one with a local professor.  That is where I kind of knocked a star off - the reveal of Holly's father is well paced but he, and his new family, are a little too good to be true and their reaction to finding out Holly exists is rather too saccharine for me.

It is a very jolly book, in the best of ways, that left me feeling happy and wanting to read more when it was finished.  All the characters are distinct and felt all too real.  There is certainly scope to investigate the lives of two or three of these in further books - especially our purple haired chef.