Portobello Book Blog

When I started reading this a few days ago, I was convinced that I’d read it before somewhere. I was right – or at least for the first chapter since I shared it with blog readers a week or so ago as part of the blog tour! Oh well, I’ll put it down to my age. And age is a bit of a worry for Lydia in Little White Lies and Butterflies as she approaches 30 without having found her Mr Right and settled down yet. Here’s what the book is about:

Lydia knows first-hand that ‘having it all’ isn’t everything it’s cracked up to be.

As far as she’s concerned, when it comes to job versus family, it’s a case of one or the other. And whilst most women her age have spent years climbing the corporate ladder, she’s made a career out of bagging her perfect man. Now, nearly thirty and still single, Lydia wonders if she’d made the right choice. 

Realising the time has come to take stock, she goes against her family’s wishes and decides to travel, in the hope of finding a new direction. At least that’s the plan.

So when Sam comes along, she decides to tell a little white lie, re-inventing herself as a professional chef – not exactly the best new identity for a woman who can’t cook. But the truth can’t stay hidden for long and when her family show up unexpectedly things go from bad to worse…

Can Lydia find love? Will she ever learn to cook? 

Little White Lies and Butterflies is a heart-warming comedy about finding your place in the world.

I really enjoyed this book and found Lydia a very likeable protagonist. She was unusual in wanting a family rather than a career and I could relate to her feeling that her friends and family wouldn’t understand this. It is unusual these days for women just to want to stay at home to look after a family rather than to combine this with work. Or perhaps it is just unusual for people to be able to do that that. When she came up with her ‘little white lie’ that she was a top chef researching Greek food, I just knew that this was going to come back to haunt her! And it most certainly did in a very amusing way. Poor Lydia’s harmless little lie got her deeper and deeper into a difficult situation and she could not see how she could dig herself out of it.

As Autumn draws in here, it was lovely to read about the Greek island setting with its little villages, sparkling sea, dramatic hills and secluded beaches. I’ve never been to Greece but this book certainly put me in the mood to visit sometime. There was a great cast of characters in the book too from the lively Greek family Lydia was staying with, to her own rather mad but hugely supportive family and Sam, the climber she meets and keeps bumping into. It seems clear to the reader than Sam might just tick all the boxes Lydia is looking for in her Mr Right but Lydia doesn’t seem to see this. And Sam is keeping a few secrets of his own….

Little White Lies is a relatively short read at around 200 pages so it was a quick and fun read. It’s light-hearted and romantic with lots to make you smile. But be warned not to read when you are hungry as the descriptions of the lovely Greek food will have you drooling!

My thanks to Sarah Hardy at Bombshell Books for my review copy. It is available in both paperback and e-book formats.  If you’d like to buy a copy you can do that online here and it’s currently only 99p for the Kindle version: Little White Lies and Butterflies

About the author

Suzie Tullett is an author of contemporary humorous fiction and romantic comedy. She has a Masters Degree in Television & Radio Scriptwriting and worked as a scriptwriter before becoming a full-time novelist. Her motto is to ‘live, laugh, love’ and when she’s not busy creating her own literary masterpieces, she usually has her head in someone else’s.

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