Dreamspinner Presents
http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=7026
Blurb
Robbie MacIntyre manages a small post office in the old Station House on the outskirts of sleepy Barton Hartshourn northwest of London. He’s stunned when the owner, Maggie, a close friend, bequeaths him not only the post office, but also Station House.
The rest of her estate is left to an American writer, Jason Young, and when he moves to the village, Robbie is thrown by the attraction he has for the man who has more of a claim on the Station House than he does.
Then there is a box that holds several rare first editions and a cookbook. Only when the secrets of the ingredients in a particular recipe are finally revealed does everything begin to make sense, and a love cut short seventy years earlier is finally discovered.
Review
Robbie is a rootless artist who is gifted a benefactor in the form of 80 year old Maggie. She and her ladies read and drink tea at the Post Office/Library she sets up in an old train station. Robbie runs the place and lives in the apartment above it – giving him time and space to paint. This works excellently for 10 years until Maggie dies. She then gifts the entire place to him in her will along with some enigmatic papers and instructions.
Jason, an American, is a long lost distant great-grand-nephew to Maggie. He’s gifted her house and the other half of the enigmatic papers and instructions. Under suspicious circumstances the house he inherits needs massive renovations and he’s forced to seek shelter with Robbie.
Well, it’s a match made in heaven… literally? The two get along great and end up solving Maggie’s “mystery” and living HEA.
**
RJ is a great writer and this short little story is a wonderful example. It’s sweet, very British: full of tea, cold weather and old things! Though the romance between them is quick, and I wish that there was more character development and maybe some more smexy times, but I enjoyed the setting and the sentiment very much.
Audio
Ian Gordon is a lovely British narrator. It really suited the story and since it’s placed in England I think choosing a British narrator was wonderful. I did chuckle a bit at his “American” accent. But it was really cute and it didn’t detract at all. I loved it!
This is absolutely the best way to appreciate this story.
4.5 of 5 hearts
