Financial problems with a rambling castle in south west Ireland, a busy hotel and restaurant, the filming of a favourite cookery competition for TV, a tangled web of relationships both current and in the past, mother and daughter issues, childhood memories, alcoholism, food-blogging, cake baking, house building, a disturbed and manipulative main character, kidnapping, sabotage, a fire and possible murder all vie for position in this new novel from Kate Lord Brown.  A bit much?
Yes, probably.  But I did keep turning the pages to see how it was all going to work out and although some parts of the ending were clearly signposted I didn’t get everything sorted in my head.  Not sure it’s quite a relaxing beach read given that you need to concentrate.  Perhaps despite the title, it’s better suited to a long winter’s evening when you’re feeling in need of that taste of summer.

The Taste of Summer by Kate Lord Brown is published by Orion on 28 July 2016 in paperback priced at £7.99.