The House Of New Beginnings by Lucy Diamond

Eloquent, Fun, Humorous

The House Of New Beginnings by Lucy Diamond

Genre: Contemporary Fiction/Chicklit

Georgie, Charlotte and Rosa's lives had brought all three to Brighton due to unfortunate plot twists in their lives, now by a lucky stroke of fate all had ended up occupying the same Regency Town House in the middle of the city near the sea front. Although, despite being named 'Seaview House', Simon, Georgie's partner, had managed to choose an apartment prior to her arrival, that was lacking this particular vista.

Rosa's reason for her change of location was as a result of her domestic situation which had turned out to be not as blissful as she had imagined it would be!

Charlotte had moved from her home town of Reading, where her parents still resided. After a loss that had been too hard to bear in a place that had too many reminders of the past and of how life could have been, moving seemed the only sensible option. Georgie, being the dutiful girlfriend had somewhat begrudgingly agreed to move down from Yorkshire at Simon's suggestion, when he had announced that he had been asked to work on a job in the picturesque seaside town for a period of 6 months. She had felt it too long a period to be apart, and besides, wasn't that what one does for the love of their life? She was however, painfully aware that her decision wasn't exactly doing anything for the feminist movement.

As the friendships between the three women increase, fuelled on by roller skating, supper clubs, girls nights and a rather awkward speed dating incident undertaken in the name of research, they bring out sides of each other that they never knew existed and a push towards events that they themselves weren't expecting or didn't think themselves ready for.

Having not read a book for over a month, I knew that the only Author that could get me back into doing what I love, would be Lucy Diamond. It took me a while to get started, but once I had, I knew that I would enjoy 'The House Of New Beginnings' just from reading the short Prologue. If you're looking for a good girly read, this is definitely for you. With the men being very much the side characters, the narrative very much empowers the three, if not four leading ladies. The fourth being 'old broad' Margo, as Georgie decides is the perfect term for the glamorous French senior citizen living upstairs. With her seductive accent, which by the way, I enjoyed imagining in my head as I read the words, due to the Author's ability to perfectly capture the dialect within the writing. Margot for me was the most adorable character, humouring Charlotte on her quest to become a home help for Margot, and sending Charlotte out to do all kinds of 'shores' to get her acquainted with every eligible, attractive, red blooded male shopping assistant in the city, and then revealing that all her extravagant purchases were in fact intended for her new, young neighbour. It isn't until later on in the book that the reason for Margot's generosity is discovered and this provides a bitter sweet twist. Rosa's story is one of the worst kinds of deception at the hands of a man she loved, and to that end you feel frustrated and sad for her, but her part of the.book has many humorous turns, such as when she is put on the spot by her very ill neighbour Jo as to whether Rosa will look after Jo's moody teenage daughter whilst she in hospital. The progression and end to her story is predictable but you are still left wondering through most of the last chapter whether it will end as you suspect.

George was the character for which I was a little disappointed as I thought her narrative would take a much more 'independent' direction, having shown her ability to secure a job she wants and taking herself off on assignments. Ultimately though I felt that the journeys of all three women (four) were concluded well. A beautiful novel as always from Lucy Diamond with lively, personable characters & natural, amusing, articulate, well written dialogue. I deliberately took my time with this novel, as I didn't want it to end and would welcome a sequel. 'A must read for the feminist'....in some regards anyway.