‘You know for an owner of a bridal shop you’re awfully cynical about marriage.’
As the owner of a second-hand bridal boutique in the little village of Alfriston, Paige Alby has seen too many tear-stained owners bring in wedding dresses that signal collapsed dreams to believe in happily ever after. So being the maid of honour at her mother’s fourth wedding isn’t exactly something she’s looking forward to… Nor is the prospect of working with Cy, her mother’s admittedly handsome but far too forward wedding planner.
Cy Thorpe has spent the last few years building a wedding empire in London catering to the rich and famous. On a trip home to see his family, he takes on a small private wedding on a whim. The last thing he expected to find was love, but the more time he spends with Paige, the more he sees past her defences to the woman who has dedicated her life to saving the things others have neglected. The hopeless romantic to Paige’s sworn cynic, can Cy get Paige to give him and happily ever after a chance?
A warm and uplifting romance, The New Beginnings Bridal Boutique is perfect for fans of Jessica Redland, Tilly Tennant and Donna Ashcroft.
Readers are loving The New Beginnings Bridal Boutique!
‘This book is all about what happens when a great romantic meets a love cynic…. A very emotional journey that is a delight to read’ Vicky, NetGalley reviewer
‘I absolutely adored this so much , I found once I picked it up I couldn’t put it down’ Tara, NetGalley reviewer
‘Such a delightful, heartwarming read. A story of hope, you can’t help but believe in love’ Emma, NetGalley reviewer
‘I really enjoyed this book, it was a quick, easy and fun read that I could not put down. It was well written, heart-warming and had me smiling with nearly every page’ Kirsty, NetGalley reviewer
My Review of The New Beginnings Bridal Boutique
Such a delightful, heartwarming read. A story of hope, you can’t help but believe in love.
Paige runs a second hand bridal boutique, giving dresses a second chance at a happily ever after. However, she’s very cynical about love. Meeting Cy, himself not in a position to make a commitment he sees love in a much more romantic way, a connection develops. Can they both take a chance for a happily ever after? I loved these two characters, and the family dynamic was just perfect, all seeing love and life in very different ways. This was a perfect escape, I couldn’t help but smile.
Thank you to Netgalley and Orion Dash for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.
Meet The Author
At the age of five Kellie Hailes declared she was going to write books when she grew up. It took a while for her to get there, with a career as a radio copywriter, freelance copywriter and beauty editor filling the dream-hole, until now. Kellie lives in Auckland, New Zealand with her patient husband and very entertaining daughter. When the characters in her head aren’t dictating their story to her, she can be found taking short walks, eating good cheese and hanging out for her next coffee fix.
Connect with her on Twitter.
Would you like to read an extract from The New Beginnings Bridal Boutique?
CHAPTER ONE
Diane Alby
and
Simon Shorter
Request the honour of your presence at their marriage.
Paige tossed the invitation to the side and fell face first into a cushion of white silk and tulle with a groan.
It was happening. Again.
Which, of course it was. She should have seen it coming. Her mother’s latest divorce had gone through, which meant it was time to get hitched again, and any hope of this latest wedding not happening was not an option. Every one of her mother’s marriages had gone ahead. Even when her fiancés were clearly wrong for her, even when wedding preparation descended into arguments and bouts of sulking followed by a tearful reunion. Whatever the trials and tribulations, her mother had always managed to trip up the aisle.
An event that was quickly followed by an end-of-marriage face plant.
At least this time, if the venue – a boutique hotel on Eastbourne’s seafront – was any indication, her mother was being sensible and keeping the wedding relatively small, which hopefully meant fewer people to gossip or cast knowing looks when it all ended.
A further glimmer of hope that her mother wasn’t going overboard had come when she’d said, while dropping off the invitation, that she’d be wearing a wedding dress from Paige’s second-hand bridal boutique, Second Chances. Which, as far as Paige was concerned, was far preferable to spending thousands on a frothy number that her mother would wear for all of a few hours, then hang up in her wardrobe, next to the four other dresses she’d worn at her four previous weddings, never to see the light of day again.
Why her mother insisted on keeping the evidence of her failed marriages, Paige had no idea. She’d not once taken Paige up on her suggestion that she sell them in her shop, instead telling her that they each held special memories, and parting with them was not an option.
Special memories? Paige pressed her head further into the metres of scratchy fabric. Memories of her mother’s second husband being caught in flagrante with the maid during their Caribbean honeymoon, then with his co-worker seven months later? Of husband number three selling her mother’s jewellery in order to fund a booze habit he’d managed to keep hidden for three years? Of husband four, who at twenty years her mother’s junior, and only five years older than Paige, had one day up and left her for someone his own age?
The only wedding dress Paige could understand her mother keeping was the one she’d married Paige’s father in. A simple cream satin sheath that flowed to the ground and featured the slightest of trains. Simple, chic, and all they could afford at the time. Her mother’s blonde hair had been kept simple, half-up half-down, with sprigs of gypsophila attached to the combs that held her hair back. She’d carried a bunch of daisies as she walked up her sandy aisle to the edge of the water, where a handful of friends and only the closest of family watched the two get married, before a beach picnic was held that lasted long into the night, until – according to her mother – the last bottle of cheap wine had been drunk and the batteries in the boom box they’d brought along to play music ran out.
Paige lifted her head and smiled at the photo of her mother and father on their wedding day that she kept on her desk. Their bodies angled towards each other. Their hands holding each other tight. Their heads thrown back in laughter at some secret joke. They were the perfect couple. Complimented each other in every way. Diane’s exuberant – and, at times, fiery – nature tempered by her father’s cool, calm, measured patience.
They truly had been made for each other. Right up until her dad’s last breath.
