Author:Virginia Franken
Publisher: Lake Union Publishing
Date of Publication: September 13, 2016
When globe-trotting coffee buyer, Amy
O’Hara, assures her husband—who stays at home to watch the kids—that it is
He Who Has it Harder… she doesn’t really believe it. That is, until the day she
gets laid off, her husband decides to devote all his waking hours to writing a
screenplay, and she discovers she’s actually the world’s most incompetent
mother.
Amy’s only possible salvation is to find another
high-flying job as quickly as possible, but with the coffee industry imploding
around her—and the competing buyers in her field being much hipper
prospects—things look pretty dire. Even if Amy does manage to find full-time
employment ever again, as her life slowly becomes more and more entwined with
her children’s, how will she be able to bear leaving them to travel for weeks
on end?
When salvation appears in the form of a movie-mogul
ex-boyfriend who wants to employ her husband and rekindle their relationship,
Amy starts to find she’s sorely tempted…
So, is there life after coffee? Amy is a laid-off coffee bean buyer who realizes that stay at home life isn't what she thought it could be. Figuring out how to be a full time mother again has its challenges. I'm not a huge coffee drinker, but I was intrigued by the premise of Life After Coffee. The debate over working mother versus stay at home mom is decades old and both sides have their strengths and weaknesses. This book does make you think about personal priorities.
I so wanted to love this book, but in the end, I just didn't. I found it kind of hard to connect with the characters. The opening was amusing and I felt bad for Amy. But as the book progressed, I had a hard time liking any of the adults in the book. The kids were definitely a product of their parenting and I felt most sorry for them. I found all of the characters selfish and just ended up being annoyed by them. I also was really put off by what Amy even contemplated with Matt. That is such a deal breaker for me.
I did end up liking the ending. I felt like the whole family ended up with the life that would give them the success needed to make it together. Even though this wasn't s story for me, it is well written and I do recommend giving it a try. Check out what others on the tour are saying below.
About the author:
Virginia Franken was born and raised in Medway, Kent, the
place where Henry the 8th sent his wives on holiday in the hope that they’d be
eaten alive by mosquitoes and save him the trouble of beheading them. Most her
childhood was spent wearing a dance leotard and tights, and at age 11 she
attended the (sort of) prestigious dance school The Arts Education School,
Tring, where she spent her teen years trying to do pique turns in a straight
line and getting drunk in the village. (The inability to do the former possibly
informed by too much opportunity to do the latter).
After graduating from The University of Roehampton, she
worked on cruise liners as a professional dancer before deciding she’d had
enough of wearing diamanté g-strings for a living and somehow managed to bag a
job in book publishing. Getting fed up of having to choose between paying
the rent or buying groceries, she eventually moved from London to Los Angeles
where life was affordable and every time she opened her mouth she got to act
all surprised and flattered when someone said they liked her accent. She then
spent years trying to convince everyone else that it was them who
had the accent, but this was never met with anything more emphatic than a
polite, “Is that so…”
These days she lives in Monrovia, near to Pasadena, with two
kids, a dog, one ever-lasting goldfish and her bearded lover, in a house that’s
just a little bit too small to fit everyone in quite comfortably. She gets most
of her writing done when she should be sleeping. LIFE AFTER COFFEE is her first
novel. If enough people buy a copy, there’s a good chance she’ll write another…
Connect with Virginia
Virginia Franken’s TLC Book Tours TOUR STOPS:
Tuesday, September 13th: A
Chick Who Reads
Friday, September 16th: Bibliotica
Monday, September 19th: Books
and Bindings
Tuesday, September 20th: Wall
to Wall Books
Thursday, September 22nd: Back
Porchervations
Monday, September 26th: Write Read Life
Wednesday, September 28th: The
Book Chick
Monday, October 3rd: Rebel
Mommy Book Blog
Thursday, October 6th: Tina
Says
Friday, October 7th: Mrs.
Mommy Booknerd
Monday, October 10th: Books a la Mode – author
guest post
Tuesday, October 11th: A Bookish Affair
Wednesday, October 12th: Lovely Bookshelf on the Wall
Thursday, October 13th: From the TBR Pile
Monday, October 17th: All Roads Lead to the Kitchen
Tuesday, October 18th: 5 Minutes for Books
Wednesday, October 19th: Reading Cove Book Club
Thursday, October 20th: Mom’s Small Victories
Monday, October 24th: Caryn, The Book Whisperer
Sunday, October 30th: Writer Unboxed – guest post
TBD: Chick Lit
Central – author guest post
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on this book for the tour.
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