Portobello Book Blog

What are you currently reading?

What have you finished reading?

I’ve recently finished The Edinburgh Skating Club by Michelle Sloan and I loved this dual time line story set in present day and 18th century Edinburgh. I reviewed the book yesterday and you can read my review here.

When you look at a painting, what do you really see?

When eighteenth-century poet Alison Cockburn accepts a light-hearted challenge from her friend Katherine Hume to live as a man, in order to infiltrate Edinburgh’s all-male skating club, little do they both realise how her new identity will shape their future.

And in the present, art historian Claire Sharp receives a mysterious request: to settle once and for all the true provenance of the iconic painting The Skating Minister.

The Edinburgh Skating Club is the tale of one woman’s mission to infiltrate a male-dominated society. Imaginative, romantic and ultimately moving, this time-shift adventure celebrates the women overlooked by history – and, above all, love, in all its unexpected forms.

What will you read next?

Next on my reading list is the memoir Women Like Us by Amanda Prowse. I’ve read loads of Amanda’s novels and she’s such a brilliant storyteller. I’ve also enjoyed her weekly piece called Tangerine where she talks about her everyday life. I find that really relatable and often very funny so I’m looking forward to this glimpse into her life.

Amanda Prowse has built a bestselling career on the lives of fictional women. Now she turns the pen on her own life.

I guess the first question to ask is, what kind of woman am I? Well, you know those women who saunter into a room, immaculately coiffed and primped from head to toe?

If you look behind her, you’ll see me.

From her childhood, where there was no blueprint for success, to building a career as a bestselling novelist against all odds, Amanda Prowse explores what it means to be a woman in a world where popularity, slimness, beauty and youth are currency—and how she overcame all of that to forge her own path to happiness.

Sometimes heartbreaking, often hilarious and always entirely relatable, Prowse details her early struggles with self-esteem and how she coped with the frustrating expectations others had of how she should live. Most poignantly, she delves into her toxic relationship with food, the hardest addiction she has ever known, and how she journeyed out the other side.

One of the most candid memoirs you’re ever likely to read, Women Like Us provides welcome insight into how it is possible—against the odds—to overcome insecurity, body consciousness and the ubiquitous imposter syndrome to find happiness and success, from a woman who’s done it all, and then some.

So that’s WWW Wednesday complete. Have you read any of these books? Do any catch your fancy? Let me know in the comments and if you take part yourself, pop a link to your post in the comments too. I do like to see what everyone is reading!