Elly In Bloom - Colleen Oakes
Published: 05/09/12
Publisher: CreateSpace
Pages: 310
Elly In Bloom is Colleen’s debut novel and what a debut novel it is! Colleen was lovely enough to send me a review copy of her book and I fell in love the minute I saw the cover!
Elly is a florist who owns her own shop and works alongside her best friend Kim and an employee affectionately referred to as Sarky Teenager. Elly has suffered serious heartbreak in the past when she walked in on her husband in bed with another woman. Since then Elly has been trying to get over what happened and carve a new life for herself in St Louis. Elly is commissioned to prepare the flowers for the biggest wedding the neighborhood has ever had and throughout the preparation, Elly discovers a lot about herself, her new neighbour Issac, the baker next door, Keith and her ex husband Aaron.
I LOVED Elly. She was a real woman; she was curvy, loved food and had bad hair days which is so refreshing to find in a book! Her passion for flowers was infectious and I loved reading about all the floral arrangements. Colleen described them in such vivid detail that I was able to picture all of the stunning bouquets.
The plot was really well thought out and I found myself being surprised at what happened. It wasn’t as predictable as I thought it would be and it was exciting to find out what Elly was going to do next. There are lots of male figures in Elly’s life; the evil ex, Issac and Keith. It was really interesting to see the way in which all of these men were totally different but how they each managed to bring about a change in Elly’s outlook on life. All of the characters were well developed; especially Elly and Sarky Teenager!
I am SO excited as there will be a sequel to this book called Elly In Love and I am hopeful that the lovely Colleen will be happy for me to review it for the blog!
This is a fantastic debut that will leave you wishing you were surrounded by a beautiful garden of flowers.
Publisher: CreateSpace
Pages: 310
Elly In Bloom is Colleen’s debut novel and what a debut novel it is! Colleen was lovely enough to send me a review copy of her book and I fell in love the minute I saw the cover!
Elly is a florist who owns her own shop and works alongside her best friend Kim and an employee affectionately referred to as Sarky Teenager. Elly has suffered serious heartbreak in the past when she walked in on her husband in bed with another woman. Since then Elly has been trying to get over what happened and carve a new life for herself in St Louis. Elly is commissioned to prepare the flowers for the biggest wedding the neighborhood has ever had and throughout the preparation, Elly discovers a lot about herself, her new neighbour Issac, the baker next door, Keith and her ex husband Aaron.
I LOVED Elly. She was a real woman; she was curvy, loved food and had bad hair days which is so refreshing to find in a book! Her passion for flowers was infectious and I loved reading about all the floral arrangements. Colleen described them in such vivid detail that I was able to picture all of the stunning bouquets.
The plot was really well thought out and I found myself being surprised at what happened. It wasn’t as predictable as I thought it would be and it was exciting to find out what Elly was going to do next. There are lots of male figures in Elly’s life; the evil ex, Issac and Keith. It was really interesting to see the way in which all of these men were totally different but how they each managed to bring about a change in Elly’s outlook on life. All of the characters were well developed; especially Elly and Sarky Teenager!
I am SO excited as there will be a sequel to this book called Elly In Love and I am hopeful that the lovely Colleen will be happy for me to review it for the blog!
This is a fantastic debut that will leave you wishing you were surrounded by a beautiful garden of flowers.
Laura