Summertime

Venetia Summers is 'buffered from single-motherhood' by boyfriend David, but when work takes him to the tropics, things begin to unravel. Phone lines crackle, e-mails languish unanswered, while children run amok, brother Desmond's outrageous wedding takes over her home and new neighbour, Hedley Sale, makes his dastardly presence felt. It's no surprise that Venetia ends up dumping David. But how is she to fend off the amorous Hedley, or break the news to the children?

“A hilarious, good-natured ode to all the wonderful messiness of domesticity.” —Newsday

“Warm and sunny . . . Barker draws us in by means of endearing characters; a keen, if neurotic wit, and a touch that is as homey as a terry-cloth bathrobe.” —People

“The comic voices are virtuoso and the immediacy of Venetia’s jottings tell it like it is—and it is very, very funny.” —The Independent (London)

“Pleasantly daffy.” —The Boston Globe

“Rafaella Barker is so good at drawing her characters. . . that within about twenty pages you feel you know them intimately and a few pages later you are almost as concerned about them as you are your real friends.” —Daily Express (London)

“A sharply drawn and wickedly funny cast of supporting characters . . . this is an utterly charming feel-good novel.” —Booklist

“Raffaella Barker’s wistful prose fills your head with soft, luminous Cezanne-like images only to be disturbed by the lively, but loveable children who run through the story . . . as you draw to the close you’ve come to care passionately about Venetia and a possible happy ending.” —The Daily Mail (London)

“Breezy yet surprisingly tender. . . . The reader needn’t be a parent to appreciate this sweetly funny ode to single motherhood.” —Publishers Weekly

“My advice is not to read Summertime in public. You’ll giggle, you’ll snort, you’ll make an exhibition of yourself.” —Country Life

“Venetia Summers has been compared by earlier reviewers to Bridget Jones, but Barker’s freshness and wit give her character a softer and more believable image . . . truly charming.” —Library Journal