The French Cookery School – Caroline James | Blog Tour Author Post | #TheFrenchCookerySchool | @CarolineJames12 @0neMoreChapter_ @rararesources

Mix together a group of mature students:
A culinary Sloane, a take-away cook and a food journalist.
Add in:
A handsome host
Season with:
A celebrity chef
Bring to the boil:
At a luxurious cookery school in France!

Waltho Williams has no idea what he’s letting himself in for when he opens the doors of La Maison du Paradis, his beautiful French home. But with dwindling funds, a cookery school seems like the ideal business plan.

Running away from an impending divorce, super-snob Caroline Carrington hopes a luxurious cookery holiday will put her back on her feet. Blackpool fish and chip café owner Fran Cartwright thinks she’s won the lottery when her husband Sid books her on a week working alongside a celebrity chef. Meanwhile, feeling she is fading at fifty, journalist Sally Parker-Brown hopes her press week covering the cookery course will enable her to boost her career.

But will the eclectic group be a recipe for success, or will the mismatched relationships sink like a souffle?

Whip out an apron, grab a wooden spoon and take a culinary trip to La Maison du Paradis, then sit back and enjoy The French Cookery School!

My thanks to Rachel of Rachel’s Random Resources for the tour invite. It’s a pleasure to host Caroline with a guest post – OMG that toe nail! 🤣 The French Cookery School is published by One More Chapter and is available in ebook, audio and paperback (25 April 2024).

GUEST POST – CAROLINE JAMES

Hello and many thanks for inviting me to your excellent blog as I celebrate the publication of my new novel, The French Cookery School – a brand new romcom!

“Research is like being a detective.”

All authors have their own way of writing and researching. For me, as much as I love Google and Wikipedia, there is nothing quite like the physical and mental process of stepping onto the paths your characters will travel on. I spent a big part of my life wishing that I could write, and when I finally decided to place my rear on a seat and glue myself to a keyboard, all I could hear were the words, “Write what you know.”

So I did.

It’s great to have a trip down memory lane as a story comes together, and often, I write about something I’ve witnessed. When researching The French Cookery School, I stood in the sunshine, outside a gorgeous old book shop in Montmorillon, in France, as the aged owner sat on a chair cutting his toenails with a large pair of shears. As a yellowing arc of hardened nail flew past, I knew that the incident would end up in the book!

My books take readers to far-flung destinations, all of which these trusty old legs have carried me to. In Coffee Tea the Caribbean and Me, I relived life in the Caribbean because it is a place I know well. I write about the Caribbean again when I take three mature friends on a cruise in my best-seller, The Cruise. Their escapades in the islands reflect my memories and the characters on the ship were inspired by my time as a guest speaker on a cruise. In The Cruise, the ladies swim unknowingly in shark-infested waters while their driver smokes a spliff, lazing in a hammock. I wonder where I got that idea from? The narrative is purely from my imagination but would I know about Red Bellies, a delicacy in Saint Vincent, if I hadn’t stepped into a back-street bakery and tried one? Or tasted the dark and velvety, almost paralysing, Sunset Rum, which is eighty-seven per cent proof and illegal to sell off the island.

I love research, it’s like being a detective, sourcing all the clues that will bring your story together.

I do hope that you enjoy The French Cookery School and I wish you and your visitors many happy reading hours. Warmest wishes, Caroline xx

Caroline James always wanted to write, but instead of taking a literary route, followed a career in the hospitality industry, which included owning a pub and a beautiful country house hotel. She was also a media agent representing celebrity chefs. When she finally glued her rear to a chair and began to write, the words flowed, and several novels later, she has gained many bestseller badges for her books.

The French Cookery School is Caroline’s tenth novel. Previously, The Cruise, described as: ‘Girl power for the over sixties!’ was an Amazon Top Ten Best Seller. Caroline’s hilarious novels include The Spa Break and The Best Boomerville Hotel, depicted as ‘Britain’s answer to the Best Marigold Hotel’.

She likes to write in Venus, her holiday home on wheels and in her spare time, walks with Fred, her Westie, or swims in a local lake. Caroline is a member of the Romantic Novelists Association, the SOA, ARRA and the Society of Women’s Writers & Journalists. She is also a speaker with many amusing talks heard by a variety of audiences, including cruise ship guests.

Follow the author: Website | X/Twitter | Facebook| Instagram | Goodreads | Amazon UK

Purchase Link   https://mybook.to/TFCS

Books by Caroline James:

The French Cookery School
The Cruise
The Spa Break
Hattie Goes to Hollywood
Boomerville at Ballymegille
The Best Boomerville Hotel
Coffee Tea the Gypsy & Me
Coffee Tea the Chef & Me
Coffee Tea the Caribbean & Me
Jungle Rock