Guest Review: Spring Tides at the Starfish Cafe by Jessica Redland

Welcome back to the Starfish Café - where you will find stunning views, delicious food and lifelong friendships.

A new season...

As winter turns to spring, Hollie - owner of The Starfish Café - is feeling content as she settles into her new life with her loving boyfriend, Jake, and their adorable dog Pickle.

But when an unwelcome visitor threatens the future of her café, Hollie must stay strong to protect her family's legacy...

A leap of faith...

Emerging from an unhappy relationship, Tori finds herself with nowhere to stay and nobody to talk to. The long-hidden secrets of her past weigh heavily on her until a chance encounter with Finley, struggling to come to terms with his own secrets, provides an opportunity to open up.

Can she find the strength to stop hiding from her past and face up to her family? Especially when that would mean letting her guard down and learning to trust again...

A fresh start...?

Little do Hollie and Tori know that their lives are about to collide at The Starfish Café and they may be able to help each other with a fresh start. After all, with good friends in your life, nothing is impossible...

Review: This is the second book in the Starfish Cafe series, following on from Snowflakes Over the Starfish Cafe. In common with many of Jessica Redland’s books, the story is set on the Yorkshire coast, in and around the fictional seaside town of Whitsborough Bay. There are many recurring characters in her books, which give them a warm feel that I very much enjoy. This book begins with a list of characters returning from the last book in the series, with details of their places in the story. It could be read as a standalone, but I feel it would be much better to read the books one after the other as the storylines are very much interlinked. 

In this book, the author continues the story of Hollie and Jake. Hollie owns and manages the Starfish Cafe in addition to running a craft business and training with the RNLI. Jake is a nurse at the local hospital, aspiring photographer and RNLI crew member. After an emotional start, they are now happy with their life together. However, their peaceful existence is suddenly threatened by an unscrupulous local businessman who it seems will go to any lengths to buy the cafe. In the meantime, Hollie has met and befriended a new customer, interior designer Tori, who has her own troubles with a relationship that has turned sour and family problems. However, when Tori meets Jake’s friend Finley, also emerging from a failed romantic partnership, it seems that they may be able to help each other. 

I really enjoyed this continuing saga of the Starfish Cafe and the people involved with the business  It was great to catch up with Hollie and Jake and find out how their relationship had developed. They are both such likeable characters who are bound to have any reader cheering them on to succeed. The introduction of a dangerous man who is bent on having the cafe for himself gave the story an unusually edgy feel and had me, along with Hollie and Jake, trying to work out his motive. I found myself worried about just how far he would go before he was stopped. Once again, the wonderful community spirit of Whitsborough Bay shone through as friends rallied around to help. I was intrigued by Tori’s story; she is from a very unorthodox family to say the least and has fought hard to establish her own identity. I am looking forward to discovering if there is more about her and Finley in the next book in the series. I can recommend this series of books to other readers; it would be a marvellous introduction for those unfamiliar with Jessica Redland’s work.  

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