Welcome to the Friday Five Challenge
Rosie Amber’s Friday Five challenge only takes five minutes, so grab a cuppa and join in!
In today’s online shopping age, readers often base their buying decisions on small postage stamp size book covers (Thumb-nails), a quick glance at the book description and the review. How much time do they really spend making that buying decision?
AUTHORS – You often only have seconds to get a reader to buy your book, is your book cover and book bio up to it?
The Friday Five Challenge is this….. IN ONLY FIVE MINUTES….
1) Go to any online book supplier,
2) Randomly choose a category,
3) Speed through the book covers, choose one which has instantly appealed to your eye,
4) Read the book Bio/ Description for this book,
5) If there are reviews, check out a couple,
6) Make an instant decision, would you BUY or PASS?
This week it’s all things French. The weather has been miserable but I’m keeping my spirits up because I’m off to France in eight days (can you tell I’m counting the days off!). And I’ve just finished reading a book set in France (the wonderful ‘The Undertaker’s Son’ by Bev Spicer), have started reading another book set in France (‘a La Mod’, that I bought as a result of reading a Friday Five Challenge post) and I’ve been watching the last week of ‘My Kitchen Rules’ with bated breath (though not at the excitement of the final cook off, but just at the sight of wonderful French chef Manu Feildel). So, my Friday Five Challenge search naturally led to France.
There were lots of books about living in France, but as I’m reading one at the moment, I don’t really need another one. I scrolled and scrolled for ages; some of the books that came up seemed to have very little to do with France but this one looked just my kind of thing.
Price: £3.49 (Kindle) and £8.99 (paperback) in the UK and $5.43 (Kindle) and $9.89 (paperback) in the US. Maybe a little pricey for a kindle book, but it is 299 pages long.
Book description:
She was taught to obey. Now she has learned to rebel.
When Princess Isabella is offered as bride to King Edward of England, for her it’s love at first sight. But her dashing husband has a secret, one that threatens to tear their marriage—and England—apart. As Isabella navigates the deadly maelstrom of Edward’s court, her cleverness and grace allow her to subvert Edward’s ill-advised plans and gain influence. But soon the young queen is faced with an impossible choice, taking a breathtaking gamble that will forever change the course of history.
In the tradition of Philippa Gregory and Elizabeth Chadwick, Isabella is the story of a queen who took control of her destiny—and the throne.
Reviews
Nineteen in the UK, mostly four star, but one 1 star. The one star review says that the reviewer liked the book, but that there were duplicate pages in their copy. Hardly the author’s fault and rather unfair. The other reviews are solid – the writer appears to have done his research. There are 336 reviews on Amazon.com, most four and five star. The lower starred reviews do cite typos and sloppy formatting, but the book description states that the current version has been changed.
Would I buy or pass? BUY
Analysis
I love historical fiction that’s a bit more history than fiction, and I’m a sucker for stories about strong historical women, so this is right up my street. I’ll be taking it to France – and hopefully the sun will be shining. Meanwhile – I’ve got the lovely Manu to keep me going!
If you want to join in the Friday Five Challenge pop over to Rosie’s blog to find out more. See what Rosie choose when she searched for Nightdress!
And have a look at some more Friday Five picks:
Barb’s enjoying the sunshine in Spain and reading about dogs!
Cathy’s already thinking about Christmas.
Liz has chosen a mystery set in the Algarve:
Shelley is looking back on previous Friday Five books from the comfort of a deck chair in Italy (I’m not jealous at all!).
Terry’s looking at beauty tips for those of a certain age.
Alison Williams Writing 