Rating : 4.75⭐️
I’ve had a great run of recommendations lately that have resulted in not only some fantastic stories but also discovering writers I’ve never read before.
Philippa Flynn’s Year of Panic and Piracy by Jacqueline Firkins is one of these, a beautifully written, heartfelt contemporary story about a woman’s journey to reconfigure her life after a typical bike ride into work nearly turns tragic. It shocks her into rethinking her current career and life.
And she makes a sea change. One that comes with disapproving parents, realistic struggles, and emotional difficulties. Financial issues too.
Philippa Flynn is so relatable. Intelligent, the one sibling who is the outlier in her uber successful family in her career choices as a history professor and her single life. And an unexpected event is about to happen to shake her life up in ways no one would have imagined.
Except perhaps for her grandmother, who left her a storied house, its contents, and a pirate ship by the sea.
As well as a surprise inside the house in the form of a tenant.
Firkins’ characters are so realistic and richly emotional. Their histories and their struggles with their families and their current situation. Just their initial impressions, and awkward conversations, funny and so beautifully crafted in its raw language and realness.
And as Philippa and Dylan navigate through their slow journey to a romantic relationship and partnership, fighting family and fears, the reader has become entrenched in their lives, rooted into their journey and emotionally invested in the outcome.
I loved the story. And could have stayed with them for longer.
And I’ll definitely be seeking out more of this author’s work.
Highly recommended.
Cover design and illustration by Philip Pascuzzo
Cover image: MarinaDreams / Getty
Other Books by this author:
Hearts, Strings, and Other Breakable Things
How Not to Fall in Love
Marlowe Banks, Redesigned
The Predictable Heartbreaks of Imogen Finch
The Goode Girls of Maple Lane
Buy link:
https://www.amazon.com/Jacqueline-Firkins/e/B07SSJGYWW/ref=dp_byline_cont_book_1
Blurb
An introverted history professor and a former romance cover model collaborate on a life-changing endeavor in a witty and swoonworthy novel about new beginnings in unexpected waters.
When a sinkhole nearly swallows her whole, burned-out history professor Philippa Flynn takes it as a wake-up call. Leaving her carefully planned but unfulfilling life behind, she moves into an old seaside house she inherited from her grandmother, a bestselling author of swashbuckling romances.
Philippa expects the clutter, disrepair, proximity to the family she deliberately moved away from, and reclusive writer she’ll be sharing the house with. She doesn’t expect that writer to also be the cover model who personified Iris Flynn’s bare-chested, cavalier-booted pirate king.
While navigating their awkward cohabitation and searching for creative inspiration, the pair discovers the outlines for six more novels they could work on together. But Philippa’s used to facts, Dylan has writer’s block, and neither can craft a love scene while real sparks are flying.
To write the story on the page, Philippa will have to embrace the one she’s living, even if it means swapping tenure for treasure maps and plans for pirate kings.
Scattered Thoughts and Rogue Words 