The Corner Shop in Cockleberry Bay

By: Nicola May

Narrated by: Penny Scott Andews

Length: 8 hrs and 10 mins

Publisher's summary

Rosa Larkin is down on her luck in London, so when she inherits a near-derelict corner shop in a quaint Devon village, her first thought is to sell it for cash and sort out her life. But nothing is straightforward about this legacy. While the identity of her benefactor remains a mystery, he - or she - has left one important legal proviso: that the shop cannot be sold, only passed on to somebody who really deserves it.

Rosa makes up her mind to give it a go: to put everything she has into getting the shop up and running again in the small seaside community of Cockleberry Bay. But can she do it all on her own? And if not, who will help her succeed - and who among the following will work secretly to see her fail?

There is a handsome rugby player, a sexy plumber, a charlatan reporter and a selection of meddling locals. Add in a hit-and-run incident and the disappearance of a valuable engraved necklace, and what you get is a journey of self-discovery and unpredictable events. With surprising and heartfelt results, Rosa, accompanied at all times by her sausage dog Hot, will slowly unravel the shadowy secrets of the inheritance and also bring her own long-hidden heritage into the light.

©2018 Nicola May (P)2018 W. F. Howes Ltd

Nice story

Good narration but sometimes hard to know which character she was speaking in. Enjoyable story though. Would recommend.

“Meh”.

The story had a reasonably good premise but falls short of the mark. The main character’s lack of common sense is grating, leading to predictable failures. Her slutty behaviour does not help readers identify or empathise with her much either. She is all over the place, literally and figuratively. One of the biggest issues is the narrator’s speech - due to her accent and manner of speaking, she sounds much like Stacey Dooley - as if she’s constantly smiling or about to laugh, even when reading dramatic passages, which spoils the book completely. Regional accents are fine in a narrator, but not when it inadvertently conveys one single emotion throughout - that of suppressed mirth. I tried to ignore it but it is impossible - I eventually gave up 2/3rds of the way through the book as it, and Rose’s character just became annoying.