Jenny Colgan

Nina Redmond is a literary matchmaker. Pairing a reader with that perfect book is her passion… and also her job. Or at least it was. Until yesterday, she was a librarian in the hectic city. But now the job she loved is no more. Determined to make a new life for herself, Nina moves to a sleepy village many miles away. There she buys a van and transforms it into a bookmobile—a mobile bookshop that she drives from neighborhood to neighborhood, changing one life after another with the power of storytelling. From helping her grumpy landlord deliver a lamb, to sharing picnics with a charming train conductor who serenades her with poetry, Nina discovers there’s plenty of adventure, magic, and soul in a place that’s beginning to feel like home… a place where she just might be able to write her own happy ending.

Carmen is at a loose end. Her gorgeous bookshop is the filming site of a cheesy Christmas movie, she's been ousted from her sister's house, and the love of her life has just flown thousands of miles away. It's threatening to be a very unjolly Christmas indeed! But when the elderly owner of the shop comes to Carmen with a Christmas wish that threatens to never come true, Carmen knows she must buckle down to get the funds to save not only his trip, but the shop itself. While fending off a shady tatt-selling businessman, Carmen discovers wonders to the shop she could have never imagined, and opens a labyrinth of bookish backrooms for the customers to get lost in. With her deadline looming, it might take more than a fresh coat of paint to solve Carmen's problems. But with the help of their neighbours, her nieces and nephew, and a very distractingly cute male nanny, Carmen might just pull her greatest magic trick yet...

Follow Gertie MacIntyre from knitting circle to air stewardess in this glorious and romantic summer novel set in Scotland’s windswept Northern isles, by beloved New York Times bestselling author Jenny Colgan. In the northernmost reaches of Scotland, where a string of little islands in the North Sea stretches towards Norway, lives Gertie MacIntyre, a proud island girl by birth. Her social circle is small but tight: family and friends, particularly the women in her knitting circle. In the whitewashed cottages of their hometown, everyone knows everyone, and the ladies of the knitting circle know more than most. In a place of long dark winters and geographic isolation, the knitting circle is a precious source of gossip, home, laughter, and comfort for them all. And while she knits, Gertie’s busily plotting what to do with the rest of her life. When Gertie develops a crush on Callum Frost, who owns the local airline, she dares herself to take a job as an air stewardess on the little plane that serves the local islands. Terrifying at first, the sixteen-seat puddle jumper also offers the first taste of real freedom she’s ever known. Will Gertie’s future lie in the skies? Or will she need to go further afield to find the adventure she craves?

Perfect for the holidays! A brand-new heartwarming Christmas novel from the beloved New York Times bestselling author of The Bookshop on the Corner and Christmas at the Island Hotel. When the department store she works in closes for good, Carmen has perilously little cash and few options. She doesn’t want to move in with her perfect sister Sofia, in Sofia’s perfect house with her perfect children and her perfectly ordered Edinburgh life. Frankly, Sofia doesn’t exactly want Carmen there either. Her sister has always been sarcastic and difficult. But Sofia has yet another baby on the way, a mother desperate to see her daughters get along, and a client who needs a retail assistant for his ailing bookshop, so welcoming Carmen might still have some benefits for everyone. At Sofia’s behest, Carmen is thrown into the daily workings of old Mr. McCredie’s ancient bookshop on the streets of the old dark city. Can she use her design skills to revamp the store and bring it back to popularity in time to benefit from Christmas shopping traffic? Can she choose between bad boy literary rock star Blair and quiet Quaker student Oke? And will she heal the rift with the most important people of all: her family?

Polly Waterford is recovering from a toxic relationship. Unable to afford their flat, she has to move miles away from everyone, to a sleepy little seaside resort in Cornwall, where she lives alone above an abandoned shop. And so Polly takes out her frustrations on her favourite hobby: making bread. But what was previously a weekend diversion suddenly becomes far more important as she pours her emotions into kneading and pounding the dough, and each loaf becomes better and better. With nuts and seeds, olives and chorizo, with local honey (courtesy of local bee keeper, Huckle), and with reserves of determination and creativity Polly never knew she had, she bakes and bakes and bakes . . . And people start to hear about it. Sometimes, bread really is life . . . And Polly is about to reclaim hers.

Life is sweet in this heartwarming tale of a little chocolate shop in Paris, by the bestselling author of Welcome to Rosie Hopkins' Sweetshop of Dreams and Meet Me at the Cupcake Cafe. Mouth-watering recipes inside! As dawn breaks over the Pont Neuf, and the cobbled alleyways of Paris come to life, Anna Trent is already awake and at work; mixing and stirring the finest, smoothest, richest chocolate; made entirely by hand, it is sold to the grandes dames of Paris. It's a huge shift from the chocolate factory she worked in at home in the north of England. But when an accident changed everything, Anna was thrown back in touch with her French teacher, Claire, who offered her the chance of a lifetime — to work in Paris with her former sweetheart, Thierry, a master chocolatier. With old wounds about to be uncovered and healed, Anna is set to discover more about real chocolate — and herself — than she ever dreamed.

Years ago, Flora fled the quiet Scottish island where she grew up -- and she hasn't looked back. What would she have done on Mure? It's a place where everyone has known her all her life, where no one will let her forget the past. In bright, bustling London, she can be anonymous, ambitious... and hopelessly in love with her boss. But when fate brings Flora back to the island, she's suddenly swept once more into life with her brothers -- all strapping, loud, and seemingly incapable of basic housework -- and her father. Yet even amid the chaos of their reunion, Flora discovers a passion for cooking -- and find herself restoring dusty little pink-fronted shop on the harbour: a café by the sea. But with the seasons changing, Flora must come to terms with past mistakes -- and work out exactly where her future lies...

Melanie and Fran are two charmingly wisecracking young Londoners who simply can't believe it when their old schoolfriend Amanda, Satan's own PR agent, manages to get herself hitched to a laird (Scottish for lord). Who cares that Fraser McConnel has worn the same ratty Converse sneakers for years and that his castle is really a pile of rubble -- all the social -climbing queen of preen cares about is the title she'll soon have. She's got Fraser by the nuptials, and she has no intention of letting go. Gentle, decent Fraser is completely innocent Amanda's wiles, so Mel and Fran, still smarting from Amanda's evil misdeeds years ago in school, join forces with Fraser's adorable younger brother Angus to sabotage the mismatch of the century. Between fighting off the attentions of a love-crazed accountant, dealing with a ne'er-do-well rockstar wannabe boyfriend, keeping Fran's deadly maneuvers with the opposite sex under control, finding herself at the heart of a bachelor party controversy, consuminglarge quantities of alcohol, and throwing out hysterical barbs that would make Oscar Wilde proud, Mel will break some hearts and win over those of readers by the score...all of whom are certain to enjoy the mayhem -- and hilarious mishaps -- in store in "Amanda's Wedding!"

Come and meet Issy Randall, proud owner of The Cupcake Cafe. Issy Randall can bake. No, more than that - Issy can create stunning, mouth-wateringly divine cakes. After a childhood spent in her beloved Grampa Joe's bakery, she has undoubtedly inherited his talent. When she's made redundant from her safe but dull City job, Issy decides to seize the moment. Armed with recipes from Grampa, and with her best friends and local bank manager fighting her corner, The Cupcake Cafe opens its doors. But Issy has absolutely no idea what she's let herself in for. It will take all her courage - and confectionery - to avert disaster ...

A grand baronial house on Loch Ness, a quirky small-town bookseller, and a single mom looking for a fresh start all come together in this witty and warm-hearted novel by New York Times bestselling author Jenny Colgan.Desperate to escape from London, single mother Zoe wants to build a new life for herself and her son Hari. She can barely afford the crammed studio apartment on a busy street where honking horns and shouting football fans keep them awake all night. If she doesn’t find a way out soon, Zoe knows it’s just a matter of time before she has a complete meltdown. On a whim, she answers an ad for a nanny job in the Scottish Highlands, which is about as far away from the urban crush of London as possible. It sounds heavenly! The job description asks for someone capable of caring for three “gifted children”, two of which behave like feral wolverines. The children’s widowed father is a wreck, and the kids run wild in a huge tumbledown castle on the heather-strewn banks of Loch Ness. Still, the peaceful, picturesque location is everything London is not—and Zoe rises to the challenges of the job. With the help of Nina, the friendly local bookseller, Zoe begins to put down roots in the community. Are books, fresh air, and kindness enough to heal this broken family—and her own…?