A Winter’s Tale

Trisha Ashley

May 2009 · Sold by HarperCollins UK

About this ebook

The perfect novel for curling up with during the long winter nights – from the No.1 bestselling author of The Christmas Invitation

Sophy Winter is not your typical Lady of the Manor. When she unexpectedly inherits Winter's End – a crumbling mansion in the beautiful Lancashire countryside – it seems like all Sophy's prayers have been answered.

But the house is decrepit and its eccentric inhabitants are a nightmare. And once it is discovered that Winter's End played host to a young Shakespeare, the entire village of Sticklepond becomes curious about Sophy's plans, especially charming Jack Lewis. But is he really smitten by Sophy...or her newly-acquired cash?

Meanwhile, Sophy’s gorgeous head gardener Seth is the strong and silent type. But does his passion bloom for anything beyond the horticultural?

A charming romantic comedy for fans of Katie Fforde and Jill Mansell – guaranteed to thaw the coldest of hearts!

Ratings and reviews

I have lost count of the number of times I have read this book. I only picked it up as I wanted something familiar to offset a rambunctious thriller that I was reading that required down time every 50 pages or so. Well, that didn't work out too well because this little beauty kept me awake for 2 or 3 hours longer than I should have been thanks to "One more chapter won't hurt". Yet again Trisha Ashley brings us a range of deeply human and believable characters that live off the page and I am pretty sure outside of her imagination too. Somewhere there is a parallel universe where The Mosses exist and they are populated by these wonderfully realised people. There is no overt characterisation here, instead everything is shown via word and deed so you just soak it all in and suddenly finding yourself giving them stern talking too when they do something silly or lose their temper due to a mis-understanding. There is a vicarious, behind the scenes thrill to be had here too. Since Sophy inherited the old manor house of Winter's End she sets about cleaning and polishing as if her life depended on it (then again she professes to find cleaning FUN - strange woman) and trying to come up with plans to improve income from the openings. Fortunately her past has seen her work in less-than-stately homes which open to the public so she is trained in basic conservation techniques and has an idea what sells to the public. There is the usual romantic plot here but somehow that just isn't important, it is just a nice little part of Sophy's journey and that of her Aunt Hebe who is very definitely a "character" in the English sense of the word. All in all a wonderful down to earth comedy read that puts the biggest of grins on my face.

Omg I loved this book. It kept me on my toes. Great read but I would have liked the ending to be longer and more detailed but I loved it. Im sad ive finished it.

Loved this book. Author is great and looking forward to reading more of her books!

About the author

Trisha Ashley was born in St. Helens, Lancashire, and gave up her fascinating but time-consuming hobbies of house-moving and divorce a few years ago in order to settle in North Wales. Trisha is currently working on her next novel, Wedding Tiers, to be published by AVON in 2009.