Christmas at Tiffany's

Author:  Karen Swan
Genre:  Romance

Five Stars

 

What do you do when the man you pledged your life to breaks your heart and shatters your dreams? You pack your bags and travel the big, wide world to find your destiny—and your true love . . .

 

Ten years ago, a young and naïve Cassie married her first serious boyfriend, believing he would be with her forever. Now her marriage is in tatters and Cassie has no career or home of her own. Though she feels betrayed and confused, Cassie isn't giving up. She's going to take control of her life. But first she has to find out where she belongs . . . and who she wants to be.

Over the course of one year, Cassie leaves her sheltered life in rural Scotland to stay with her best friends living in the most glamorous cities in the world: New York, Paris, and London. Exchanging comfort food and mousy hair for a low-carb diet and a gorgeous new look, Cassie tries each city on for size as she searches for the life she's meant to have . . . and the man she's meant to love.

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Cassie is married to Gil, a barrister.   He divides his time between the week in Edinburgh and the weekend with her at their massive home in rural Scotland. They are having a party to celebrate their ten-year anniversary together.  During the course of the party, she overhears a conversation between her husband and his girlfriend that sends her life spiraling into a tailspin.  Stunned, hurt, disjointed, she is immediately packed up and hustled out of the house by her three best friends:  Kelly, a high-powered fashion promoter who lives in New York; Anouk, a jewelry designer to the rich and famous who lives in Paris; and Suzy, a wedding planner who lives in London.  It is decided among the three that Cassie will have one year to decide where she wants to live (all hopeful that she will choose near them), and will spend four months with each of them trying out her "new life."

 

While it is apparent early on how the novel will end, watching it all unfold is pleasurable.  Because this is not just Cassie's story, but also the story of her three friends.  The beginning of her journey is her new life with Kelly in New York.  Her chance meeting in Central Park with Henry, the brother of her friend Suzy, begins her on her search to find what she wants in life, with his help along the way.  A fledgling in the ways of the world, she is brought into the fashion industry and finds new friends and a new love.  A terrible misstep shows her life unraveling again, and it is through Kelly's loyalty and that of her new friends that she manages to hold on.  Although they implore her to stay, at the end of her four months she find herself in...

 

...Paris, with Anouk, who has gotten her a job at Dior.  Cassie finds that at this point she is honing her skills in the fashion industry, more sure of herself than she has ever been.  Making even more friends and believing she has at last found what she wants, she discovers something devastating that has been secret for a long time, which sends her running to...London and Suzy, where she will finally find who she is and what she truly wants out of life.

 

This is a wonderful book; about so much more than the title suggests.  Christmas at Tiffany's isn't about Christmas as it is so much about the beginning of a journey which causes changes in the lives of four women, and on the strength of themselves and their relationships to each other.  Highly recommended.

http://www.amazon.com/Christmas-at-Tiffanys-Karen-Swan/dp/0062364103/

Goodreads:  https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1091654819