Ella Risbridger

Recipes that reveal the life-changing happiness of cooking There are lots of ways to start a story, but this one begins with a chicken. Midnight Chicken (& Other Recipes Worth Living For) is a cookbook. Or, at least, you'll flick through these pages and find recipes so inviting that you'll head straight for the kitchen: roast garlic and tomato soup, uplifting chilli-lemon spaghetti, charred leek lasagne, squash skillet pie, spicy fish finger sandwiches or burnt-butter brownies. It's the kind of cooking you can do a little bit drunk. It's the kind of cooking that is probably better if you've got a bottle of wine open, and a hunk of bread to mop up the sauce. But if you sit down with this book and a cup of tea (or that glass of wine), you'll also discover that it's an annotated list of things worth living for: a manifesto of moments worth living for. Because there was a time when, for Ella Risbridger, the world had become overwhelming. Sounds were too loud, colours were too bright, everyone moved too fast. One night she found herself lying on her kitchen floor, wondering if she would ever get up - and it was the thought of a chicken, of roasting it, and of eating it, that got her to her feet, and made her want to be alive. This is a cookbook to make you fall in love with the world again

A DELICIOUS MAGAZINE BEST COOKBOOK OF THE YEAR * A GLOBE AND MAIL TOP 10 COOKBOOK OF THE YEAR Shortlisted for the Andre Simon Best Cookbook Award 2022 From the author of Midnight Chicken , a month-by-month chronicle of writing and recipes that explores joy and healing through food. "A gift to readers and cooks alike ... wise and tender, a reminder that however gloomy your situation, the world abounds in beauty, should you choose to see it.” ― The Washington Post "Exuberant, unstoppable, and triumphantly on the side of love and life in the face of death and loss and grief." ― Vox This cookbook is about a year in the kitchen (and in the garden under the fire-escape steps). A year of grief and hope and change; of cardamom-cinnamon chicken rice, chimichurri courgettes, quadruple carb soup, blackberry miso birthday cake, and sticky toffee Guinness brownie pudding. A year of loss, and every kind of romance, and fried jam sandwiches. A year of seedlings and pancakes. A year of falling in love. A year of recipes. A year, in other words, of minor miracles. In Ella Risbridger's first book Midnight Chicken, she showed readers how food can serve as a light in our darkest days. Now, in The Year of Miracles, Ella shares her story of recovering from loss with the help of good food and good friends. The book celebrates making a fancy dinner even if you’re just eating it with a spoon in front of the tv; having people over to dinner without overthinking it; finding late night snacks to ease you to sleep; and having seconds--of everything. Above all, it a powerful testament to how cooking can help us get up and start again in the face of unimaginable hurt. With tender vulnerability, mesmerizing prose, and delectable recipes, The Year of Miracles is a touching, unforgettable book on finding hope through food.

When Isobel Petty is orphaned, she finds herself being taken away from her home in India and sent to live with a distant uncle in England. On board the S.S. Mariana, she witnesses a shocking act – somebody being thrown overboard in the middle in the night. But when the ship’s captain insists that nobody is missing, Isobel and her two new reluctant friends must solve two mysteries – the identities of both the murderer and the victim – before they reach England and the culprit has the chance to escape. Inspired by The Secret Garden and the golden age of crime writing, The Secret Detectives is a gripping, beautifully historical mystery, from an incredible new voice in children’s fiction – perfect for fans of Robin Stevens and Katherine Rundell.