[ad_1]
Today I’m pleased to be featuring romantic fiction author Elliot Fletcher and sharing my review of her novel, Whisky Business. Elliot will be taking part in a panel at the Edinburgh Women’s Fiction Festival this very afternoon giving an insight into indie and traditional publishing along with Julia Boggio and Jayne Castel. This event will be chaired by the Jane Anderson, one of the festival’s founders. Tickets for individual events are still available. Check the website for all details and sign up to the mailing list: Edinburgh Women’s Fiction Festival
You can listen to Elliot on the She Reads podcast this week and catch up with all the other authors who have already taken part
Read on as I share my thoughts on Elliot’s novel Whisky Business.
Whisky Business is a book that caught my eye when I saw it being reviewed on Linda’s Book Bag so I bought myself a copy. I love books set on Scottish islands so the Skye setting of this appealed as well as the promise of a ‘spicy’ romance featuring a hunky whisky distiller and Hollywood actress. Well, it certainly delivered on the spice level although personally I’m not keen on that word. I’m not sure what I’d use instead: raunchy, steamy, hot? All of these would apply to the relationship between April and Mal!
There are many romantic fiction tropes brought together in this book – first crush, grumpy/sunshine, enemies to lovers – and it works beautifully. It was actually the second book in a row I’d read which featured a famous actor in a relationship with someone not in the business and showed all the problems which can come along with that.
The initial part of the book saw April returning to her small home town on Skye following a nose-dive in her career and the death of her grandfather who owned the local whisky distillery. Malcolm McCabe has been trying to keep the distillery afloat and is not at all keen on what he sees as new-fangled ideas which April suggests to improve business. They clash all the time but there is so obviously a growing attraction between the two. When they inevitably get together, my goodness! Let’s just say that the next time I go on a tour of a whisky distillery, I won’t be looking at the whisky barrels in the same way!
Although both April and Malcolm might appear to be quite strong people they both have their vulnerabilities and I liked the way Elliot Fletcher explored these. This inner vulnerability and their anxieties made April and Mal feel like realistic characters and I liked they way they found out about each other, supported each other and discovered what they both really wanted. Their relationships with their families had shaped them and made them the way they are: April, determined to make something of herself and Malcolm rather reclusive. Although April hadn’t returned home to Skye for some time, I liked how her friends and the community accepted her once again as one of their own.
I thoroughly enjoyed Whisky Business and am pleased it’s the first in a trilogy featuring the McCabe brothers. Although it seems a long time to wait till June next year to read Callum’s story!
Full Book Details
One flirty Hollywood actress. One grumpy Scottish islander. One magnetic connection.
When her acting career hits rock bottom, Hollywood star April Sinclair returns to her Scottish hometown on the Isle of Skye to lick her wounds. In desperate need of distraction, she sets her sights on restoring her family whisky distillery to its former glory. But she wasn’t expecting short-tempered and totally irresistible Malcolm McCabe to be the one in charge.
Master distiller Mal has three loves in his life: whisky, his dog, and silence. He has no time for the pampered princess poking her nose around, even if said princess is the one who got away. Mal is content to wait her out. She’ll grow bored and run back to her glamorous world eventually.
But their shared desire to save the distillery will mean working a lot closer than either of them might wish …
With a stunning rural Scottish setting, a healthy measure of steaminess, and a rugged heartthrob to die for, opposites definitely start to attract in this spicy enemies-to-lovers, grumpy-sunshine romcom.
About the Author
Romance writer Elliot Fletcher resides in her too small flat in Edinburgh, Scotland, with her husband, cat, and dog. When she isn’t writing about swoon-worthy, loveable men and the captivating heroines they fall for, you can find her browsing secondhand bookshops, collecting pebbles on the beach, or rewatching the 2005 Pride & Prejudice.
[ad_2]
Source link