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Love Home on the Road Home by Margaret Amatt #Review #GlenbriarBook15

We are returning to the beautiful Scottish Highlands for Margaret Amatt's  fifteenth in her Glenbriar  Series:Love Match on the Road Home. This latest novel was published on 3rd October by Leannan Press   After tennis star Georgie Porter retires at just thirty-one, she buys a campervan and returns to her hometown of Glenbriar, hoping to make amends for the hurts she caused to a former sweetheart. But instead of finding the man whose heart she broke many years ago, she comes face to face with his younger brother, Kerr. Easy-going and quietly loyal, high school teacher Kerr Halley has strong opinions about Georgie Porter – and there are rules about interacting with your brother’s ex, no matter how long ago she split with him. Especially when Kerr has always secretly carried a torch for her. When they’re thrown together to fundraise for a local sports project, old grudges begin to thaw, and Kerr’s true feelings come to light. As Georgie rediscovers the charm of small...

The Secret of the Chateau by Kathleen McGurl #Review #Publication Day


Welcome to the blog tour to celebrate the release of Kathleen McGurl's historical novel, The Secret of the Chateau, today on May 15th by HQ Digital. 
 
Everything is about to change…


1789. Pierre and Catherine Aubert, the Comte and Comtesse de Verais, have fled the palace of Versailles for their château, deep in the French Alps. But as revolution spreads through the country, even hidden away the Auberts will not be safe forever. Soon they must make a terrible decision in order to protect themselves, and their children, from harm.


Present day. When Lu’s mother dies leaving her heartbroken, the chance to move to a château in the south of France with her husband and best friends seems an opportunity for a new beginning. But Lu can’t resist digging into their new home’s history, and when she stumbles across the unexplained disappearance of Catherine Aubert, the château begins to reveal its secrets – and a mystery unsolved for centuries is uncovered…


 My Thoughts
With alternating chapters, you follow the narratives of two stories, one set at the time of the French Revolution and the other in present day France. As you pick up the threads of each timeline, there is no confusion, so deftly is this novel plotted. There is plenty of historical detail about the life at Versailles during the reign of Louis XVI and the tensions between the ordinary French people and the aristocrats where certain levels of society felt that they had a divine right to the lion's share of the riches of the country. When you travel forward in time to the group of friends who decide to emigrate to France and to settle in the Chateau, you can see that the prosperous retirees have no difficulty in finding their own niche in the French society.

    You can see attitudes to bringing up children in both storylines. Catherine Aubert copies the approach of the aristocrats she meets in the French court and largely hands her son over to the servants. You see how her thoughts about this develop. The children of the ex-pats have grown up but you discover the importance they have to their parents even in adulthood. There are some interesting plotlines and situations throughout. I did guess the secret of the chateau but that did not detract from my enjoyment of this historical novel. 

In short: A dual timeline contrasts life in a French chateau over the centuries.  
About the Author


Kathleen McGurl lives in Bournemouth with her husband. She has two sons who have both now left home. She always wanted to write, and for many years was waiting until she had the time. Eventually she came to the bitter realisation that no one would pay her for a year off work to write a book, so she sat down and started to write one anyway. Since then she has published several novels with HQ and self-published another. She has also sold dozens of short stories to women's magazines, and written three How To books for writers. After a long career in the IT industry she became a full time writer in 2019. When she's not writing, she's often out running, slowly.

You can read my rebiew of these books by Kathleen here: 
 
You can follow Kathleen here: Website  |  Twitter    |  Facebook 

                                                |  Instagram



Book links: Amazon UK    |  Amazon US  



Thanks to Kathleen McGurl, HQ Digital and Rachel of Rachel's Random Resources for a copy of the book and a place on the tour.



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Comments

  1. Thank you so much for this review and for being a publication day blogger!

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