Summer Island - Natalie Normann (Blog Tour)

Date of Reading: 25/06/2020

Author: Natalie Normann

Publisher: Harper Collins

Publication Date: June 24, 2020

Source: NetGalley

Rating: 4/5

(This review is part of the blog tour organised by Random Things Tours)

About the book:

He never meant to stay.

He certainly never meant to fall in love…

Summer Island off the coast of Norway was the place London chef Jack Greene should have been from. He’s an outsider in the community that should have been his family, and now he’s setting foot on the strange land he has inherited for the first time.

The welcome is a mix of distrust and strange gifts of food, especially from enigmatic Ninni Toft, his nearest neighbour, who has arrived for the season to get over a broken heart. Her wild spirit and irrepressible enthusiasm for the quirky locals are a heady brew for city-boy Jack, who is discovering the simple pleasures of island life – and what it means to belong. To a place. To a people. To one person in particular…

Home is where the heart is but is Jack’s heart with the career he left behind in London, or on the wind-swept shores of Summer Island, with Ninni?

Review:

        It's not every day we come by a book set on a Norwegian island. And that was more than enough reason for me to pick this book. Telling that it lived up to my expectations will be an understatement. Suffice to say this is one of the most relaxing reads I had this year.

      If Norway is half as beautiful as the books shows, it will be a shame not to visit it once. The place-names might be hard to pronounce, but the fun, laughter and the friendly faces Norway offers is going to mesmerise you from the beginning of the story. This could be the story of Jack and Ninni, but little summer island, you are the real hero. Anyone will need an ice-cold heart to leave that place.

       A summer fling turning into something more, an English man finding his roots. . . 'Summer Island' is this and much more. Jack and Ninni are there on the island for different reasons, but both find a new purpose there. I loved the way the story progressed expertly linked with the life of the island community. Nosy neighbours and a dog with human intelligence just adds to the mirth.

        What are you waiting for then? Stock up your fridge (warning: prepare to witness the slow and painful demise of your diet plans) before grabbing a copy. You will love it for sure!

Meet the author:

Natalie Normann grew up in a shipping town on the west coast of Norway and always wanted to be a writer. Actually, she wanted to smoke cigars and drink whiskey like Hemingway but settled for chocolate and the occasional glass of Baileys.

Her writing journey started with short stories in women’s magazines until her first book was published in 1995.

Summer Island is her first romance written in English.