The Little Beach Street Bakery By Jenny Colgan

[amazon_link id=”0751549215″ target=”_blank” ][/amazon_link]’The Little Beach Street Bakery’ is the latest book by RONA winner, Jenny Colgan

Polly Waterford is recovering from a toxic relationship. Unable to afford their townhouse, she has to move miles away from everyone, to a sleepy little seaside resort in Cornwall, where she lives alone above an abandoned shop. And so Polly takes out her frustrations on her favourite hobby: making bread. But what was previously a weekend diversion suddenly becomes far more important as she pours her emotions into kneading and pounding the dough, and each loaf becomes better and better. With nuts and seeds, olives and chorizo, with local honey (courtesy of local bee keeper, Huckle), and with reserves of determination and creativity Polly never knew she had, she bakes and bakes and bakes …And people start to hear about it. Sometimes, bread really is life …And Polly is about to reclaim hers.

As a life long fan of Jenny and her stories of humour, food and love, ‘The Little Beach Street Bakery’ was definitely a book I was looking forward to and just like Jenny’s previous book, it was another adorable and witty tale that had me giggling throughout.

The story is primarily seen through the eyes of the protagonist of the story, Polly Waterford (I love that name) who moves to a small seaside rundown village called Mount Polbearne, looking to start over again. Leaving behind a failed business venture and relationship, she is determined to look at the bright side and think of her new place in life as a new chapter and a new beginning. But, she doesn’t settle easily into the village, her landlady is a grumpy old woman who is reluctant for change and tries to prevent Polly from what she does best – baking. But news quickly spreads through the village that she can make the best breads and pastries and Polly suddenly finds herself famous as everyone wants to eat her bread particularly a gentle fisherman and an American bee-keeper and an astoundingly charismatic puffin called Neil.

I started to read this book on a long bus that I normally hate, but on this particular journey, I found myself not wanting it to end as I had just been introduced to Neil, an injured puffin who comes into Polly’s life and becomes her first friend in Mount Polbearne. A wonderful inclusion in the story, I loved the scenes with Polly and Neil, the cute descriptions of every time he eeped, I sighed or laughed and found myself reading extracts with the pair of them aloud.

The story is of a sweet nature, a young woman starting over again. She reflects regularly on where she went wrong and finds herself comparing her positions to others and where she should be in life. Not only does the story concentrate on Polly getting her life together and befriending a puffin, it focuses on the recession. The small bleak rundown village where money isn’t plentiful and people work long hard hours. We read scenes of fisherman working in terrible conditions in unpredictable weather which makes for a sad but realistic side to the story.

Alongside Polly and Neil, there are an array of characters who all have a story to share, some sad and some unexpected and in Jenny’s typical style there are some twists and poignant tales that make for bittersweet reading.

‘The Little Beach Street Bakery’ is a tremendous story, that I loved. Deliciously fun, tenderly sad and heartwarming in hearts, this book is a delight to read and a must read for all book and puffin lovers!

You can buy [amazon_link id=”0751549215″ target=”_blank” ]The Little Beach Street Bakery from Amazon[/amazon_link] and is available to buy from good bookshops.