#blogtour – Summer Sundaes (The Boardwalk by the Sea) by @GeorginaTroy @BrookCottageBks #bookreview #giveaway
I’m delighted to be taking part in the blog tour for Summer Sundaes by Georgina Troy which is a lovely, warm read. It’s the first in The Boardwalk by the Sea series so there are more pleasures to come too. So what’s it all about?
Genre: Contemporary Fiction/Romance
Release Date: 15 July 2017
Publisher: Green Shutter Books
Wipe off your flip flops, it’s going to be a bumpy ride…
When Sacha Collins, cafe owner and sundae-maker extraordinaire, meets Italian archaeologist, Alessandro Salvatore in Rome, she’s grateful to him for being her tour guide. Now he’s turned up in the seaside village where she lives, known locally as, The Boardwalk by the Sea and is setting up a gelateria in direct competition to her retro Summer Sundaes Café.
She’s only been running her café for two years since taking over from her father. Until now the only other shops on the boardwalk have been a wool shop, an antique shop and a second-hand book shop. These have helped rather than hindered her custom. How will her creative sundaes made from fresh Jersey ice cream compete with his delicious Italian gelato?
Sacha is worried. Is there enough custom for both businesses to thrive? Who is behind the strange changes being made on the boardwalk? And when the oldest resident on the boardwalk is threatened with eviction can Sacha and Alessandro come together and find a way of helping her?
For a peaceful little boardwalk overlooking one of the quieter beaches on the island, there’s an awful lot going on and some of it is going to lead to big changes.
Summer Sundaes is an utterly charming read. We start off in one of my favourite places, Italy and in Rome to be precise where Sacha is holidaying with her aunt. Gorgeous Alessandro is asked to show Sacha the sights of Rome and the story got off to a lovely start as we accompanied the pair around such wonders as the Trevi Fountain and the Spanish Steps. But all good things come to an end and Sacha returns to Jersey and to her beloved Summer Sundaes cafe.
Jersey is portrayed so well in the book. It’s not somewhere I have been to but I would love to go, especially after reading about it here. Alessandro turns up in Jersey and Sacha gets to return the tour guide favour by showing him the historical sights. But I guess the star of the show is The Boardwalk by the Sea where not only Summer Sundaes is located but also Bella’s antique shop and Jools’ bookshop along with, shock horror, Alessandro’s family’s new gelato shop which is in competition with Sacha’s cafe.
I loved the descriptions of the food. The gelato sounds amazing and so do Sacha’s sundaes. And there’s the cabbage loaf (never heard of it before but it sounds so unusual) and the Jersey Wonders which are a kind of doughnut. It’s the kind of detail I love in a book and so I was glad to see recipes for these treats at the back.
There’s a lovely cast of characters. I liked Sacha and Alessandro a lot but the other characters, such as Bella, Jack (Sacha’s brother) and aunt Rosie are also lots of fun too. The story is a feel good one, a light and fairly quick read but not lacking substance.
I’d love to take a walk down the Boardwalk, maybe call at Summer Sundaes for a pancake or some cabbage loaf and a sundae, or perhaps stop at Gelato di Isola for a gelato to take to the beach and watch the waves. Alas, I will have to make do with my imagination and carry on reading lovely books like this one.
With thanks to the publishers and Brook Cottage Books for the review copy and the place on the blog tour. If you like the sound of Summer Sundaes then here are the buying links you need:
A character in Autumn Antics (book 2) named after someone the winner nominates, i.e themself/family member.
a Rafflecopter giveaway
Georgina Troy is the pseudonym of author Deborah Carr. Her first book, A Jersey Kiss was a finalist in the Contemporary Romance Category of the Romantic Novel of the Year Awards 2016 (RoNAs) and finalist in the Joan Hessayon Award for New Writers 2015.
Her WW1 historical romance, Broken Faces, written in her own name, Deborah Carr, was runner-up in the Good Housekeeping Novel Writing Competition 2012. She lives on the island of Jersey with her husband, two children and three rescue dogs. Her books are published by Accent Press and Green Shutter Books. Georgina is a member of The Blonde Plotters.
Georgina’s new series, The Boardwalk by the Sea, includes four standalone novels about friends, Sacha, Bella, Lexi and Jools. Each book is set in a different season. The girls live on or near a small seaside village known locally as The Boardwalk by the Sea and all of them make an appearance in the books throughout the series but each book will focus on one of the friends.
Summer Sundaes (book 1)
Autumn Antics (book 2) – due Spring 2018
