I'm delighted to be taking part in the blog tour for Rachael Feathstone's debut novel, Puzzle Girl, with not only a review below but Rachael has also kindly taken the time to provide us with an insight to her reading and writing space,
Puzzle Girl
Rachael Featherstone
Accent Press
March 2017
Rating 4/5
Love is a riddle waiting to be solved...
Clued-up career girl Cassy Brookes has life under control until one disastrous morning changes everything. When she finds herself stuck in a doctor s surgery, a cryptic message left in a crossword magazine sends her on a search to find the mysterious puzzle-man behind it.
Cassy is soon torn between tracking down her elusive dream guy, and outwitting her nightmare workmate, the devious Martin. Facing a puzzling love-life, will she ever be able to fit the together and discover the truth behind this enigmatic man?
Puzzle Girl is one of them books that comes along and completely takes you by surprise.
The novel starts with an intriguing prologue that sets the story perfectly before really getting in to its groove in the first few chapters.
Cassy has everything planned out and is dedicated to her job, pushing for a promotion she sets out against her competition, Martin.
Only on the day of her presentation she ends up in the local medical centre where she finds a puzzle book whilst waiting. With all the puzzles filled out, Cassy starts her own leaving some cryptic clues, only to discover that it has been answered and correctly when she goes for a check up.
This starts a mission for her to find 'Puzzle-Man' but faces consequences along the way.
As Cassy's search becomes and obsession she starts to lose sight of what is really important in her life, not forgetting the crazy things she starts to do to beat Martin. It was great to read about a main character eventually realising her mistakes and seeing her turn her life around.
There where some great sub plots within the story, I loved Cassy's best friend Dan who is more like a brother to her. He was straight talking but had his own issues going on that Cassy failed to spot - even when he moved in with her!
The other sub plot was with Cassy's ex, Seph, and her colleague's boyfriend Joey.. I wont say anymore other than I had my suspicions quite early on and I was right!
One of the things I enjoyed the most about reading Puzzle Girl was the mix up of crosswords, emails and texts that where sporadically placed at the beginning and end of chapters... it gave a fresh look to reading by keeping it interesting.
Overall, Puzzle Girl was a great debut book. It was fast paced, fun and clever with a good cast of characters. The only thing for me that let the book own was that there was no epilogue - if your a follower of my blog and reviews then you will know this is something I enjoy reading as like to see what happens to the characters - or maybe I'm just nosy haha!
Guest Post
My Book Corner - Rachael Featherstone
It is probably true of both my “book corner” and my writing space that they are everywhere throughout my house. There are books in every room, we have two large bookcases – one in the hallway and one on the landing and then we have a whole wall of bookcases in our joint study. I love being surrounded by books and I think that is why I can write in any room in the house – it is very inspiring to be surrounded by words. When I’m writing a first draft I tend to mainly write at the dining room table.
Do you have a favourite shelf/collection of books? Or favourite part of your Book Corner?
In the bookcase on the landing I have a shelf which has all my favourite romantic comedy novels and women’s fiction. Sophie Kinsella, Dorothy Koomson, Elizabeth Noble and Cecelia Ahern. These are book I could read again and again.
I write in long bursts. Twelve hour plus days in which I can write up to 7,000 words. Then typically the next day, will be a rest day. I like to write a first draft on my laptop and then I print it out and edit by hand. When it comes to reading, it happens in bursts too. Partly because I don’t tend to read whilst I am writing a book so when I am in between drafts I binge read.
Very badly and I’m open to advice! I buy a lot of books that I had no intention of buying on random trips to the bookshop. I also buy a lot of kindle books based on recommendations I see on Twitter. So when it comes to deciding which book to read first I never know where to start. I usually select one at random that takes my fancy on that particular day.
Twitter: @WRITERachael
Facebook: Rachael Featherstone Author
Website: www.writerachael.com
You can also find that characters from my debut novel Puzzle Girl on Twitter too.
Puzzle-girl: @_puzzle_girl
This sounds like a good one. I like the sound of the puzzles in it. Off to Amazon, thank you :)
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