My One Month Marriage

Low Shari

Description

'Funny, warm and insightful.' Dorothy Koomson, bestselling author
“I just need to know...which one of you slept with my husband?”

You know that "till death do us part" bit in the wedding vows? Well, Zoe Danton believed it. One month after she said “I do”, the man she loved is gone, given his marching orders after Zoe discovered a devastating secret.

As teenagers facing a crushing loss, Zoe made a pact with her three sisters to stick together no matter what. Now she’s discovered that one of them may have been the reason her husband betrayed her. She’s lost her happy-ever-after, but has she lost a sister too?

Praise for Shari Low:

‘I’d forgotten how enjoyable it is to read a Shari Low book but My One Month Marriage reminded me of the fun to be had in her words. This is a tale of a woman who becomes involved in an unwise relationship that leads to an extremely short marriage, but it is so much more. The relationships, rivalries and revelations that exist between sisters, friends and families are expertly explored in this joy of a story. Do yourself a favour and pick it up now. My One Month Marriage is funny, warm and insightful.’ Dorothy Koomson
'Great fun from start to finish.' Jenny Colgan
'There are only two words for Shari Low: utterly hilarious. I laughed like a drain.' Carmen Reid
'One of the funniest books I've ever read!' Marisa Mackle
'More fun than a girl’s night out!' OK! magazine
'A brilliant, light comical read with some fabulous twists and turns' Bookbag
'A thrilling page turner that grabs your attention from the off. Highly recommended' The Sun
'Feisty Fun' The Mirror
'Totally captivating and it felt like I'd lost a new best friend when it came to the end' Closer Magazine
'Touching stuff' Heat

What readers are saying about My One Month Marriage:

'I certainly recommend it for all book lovers looking for a great story and good characters.'

'Personally I think it was a lovely book and is worth all the time of woman's fiction readers.'

' A nice and light entertaining read that brought tears to my eyes'

'I actually enjoyed every character and thought [Shari] did a great job of bringing them to life!'

'this new book doesn't disappoint.'

'A fun filled book which I would recommend.'

'Overall this is a great read, anyone with sisters will absolutely relate.'

'The author made the characters come alive, and I was almost sad when I finished the book, because it meant I would have to say goodbye to these people'

Sujets

• Vie de famille
• Relations familiales
• Soutien psychologique et conseils familiaux
• Mashups
• Holidays
• Siblings
• Humorous
• Women
• Coming of Age
• Men
• Escocia
• Friendship
• Sibling
• General officer
• Mother's Day
• Woman
• Valentine's Day
• The Women
• City Life
• Summer
• Wedding
• General
• Topic
• Spring
• Family Life
• Romance
• Scotland
• Christmas
• Fiction

Informations

• Publié par: Boldwood Books
• Date de parution: 21 janvier 2020
• Nombre de lectures: 2
• EAN13: 9781838892012
• Langue: English

Extrait

MY ONE MONTH MARRIAGE


SHARI LOW
This book is dedicated to my aunt, Liz Murphy Le Comber, an incredible woman of strength, substance, wisdom and talent who will always be the yin to my yang.
To Rachel and Eleanor Le Comber, who are just all kinds of awesome. I adore you both.
To the memory of my uncle, Dr Steve Le Comber, who will forever be the missing link in our family and our Trivial Pursuit team.

And as always, to my menfolk, J, C & B… Everything, always. X
CONTENTS



You are cordially invited to meet the bride and groom’s family and friends…


Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Epilogue


More from Shari Low

Acknowledgement

About the Author

Also by Shari Low

About Boldwood Books
YOU ARE CORDIALLY INVITED TO MEET THE BRIDE AND GROOM’S FAMILY AND FRIENDS…

The Bride - Zoe Danton, 33 - strong, driven partner in the cutting-edge marketing company, The B Agency, still tender after being dumped by the love of her life.

Tom Butler, 31 - Zoe’s business partner (present tense) and the man who broke her heart (past tense).

Chrissie Harrison, 31 - Tom’s childhood sweetheart and mother of his twelve year old son, Ben.

Roger Kemp 44 - hotel chain owner and client of The B Agency. Married to Felice, 26, a model who last smiled sometime in the nineties.

Sister of the Bride - Verity Danton, 34 - an exercise-obsessed primary school teacher who works with kids and doesn’t even pretend to like grown-ups.

Ned Merton, 32 - Verity’s colleague, friend and the object of her affections. She just hasn’t told him yet.

Sister of the Bride - Yvie Danton , 31 - the youngest sister, a nurse on the geriatric ward of Glasgow Central Hospital, funny, kind, caring and the best friend that everyone should have in times of fun and crisis.

Charge Nurse Kay Gorman, 35 - Yvie’s best mate in and out of work. A single parent, raising her son, Chester, 6.

Dr Seth McGonigle, 38 - socially awkward and perfectly formed orthopaedic surgeon, married to the head of cardiology.

Carlo Moretti, 30 - Yvie’s friend and waiter in the whole Danton family’s favourite Italian restaurant, owned by his father, Gino.

Sister of the Bride - Marina Danton-Smythe , 35 - the eldest sister, a wealthy helicopter mum who runs her family’s lives with military precision.

Graham Smythe, 35 - Marina’s husband of thirteen years, a wealthy banker, who has somewhere along the years changed from being her dashing Alpha male to a workaholic bore.

Oscar and Annabelle Danton-Smythe, 12 - Marina’s phone-obsessed twins.

Mother of the Bride - Marge Danton Walton Morrison, 53. Now on her third husband, Derek, 55, and it already looks like he’s going to have as much marital success as their father, Will (divorced in 1999), and Marge’s second husband, Gregor (divorced 2008).

Father of the Bride - Will Danton - Marge’s first husband and father of the Danton sisters.
1
THE FOUR SISTERS – PRESENT DAY: SUNDAY, 2 P.M.

I’m in one of those unofficial clubs that no one really wants to be in. You know, like the ‘Association of People Who Got Jilted at The Altar’. Or ‘The Secret Society of Dumplings Who Let Online Scammers Empty Their Bank Account Because They Believed They Had A Long-Lost Uncle Who Left Them Millions In His Will.’
In this case, I’m Zoe Danton, the latest fully paid up member of the ‘Collective Of Fools Who Had Marriages That Lasted For Less Time Than A Four-Part Mini-Series.’
A month. Thirty days to be precise.
It’s not even as if I have the folly of youth as an excuse. Thirty-three years on this planet is long enough to learn some vital life lessons. For healthy oral hygiene, always floss morning and night. If it sounds too good to be true, then it probably is. If you get caught in a riptide, swim parallel to the shore. Pot pourri has no purpose. And if you’re getting married, ensure that it’ll last longer than the flowers you carried up the aisle.
Otherwise, you’ll be me, the idiot who is sitting on her wide plank, oak floor, consumed by fear that the local newspaper will use my story as a human-interest feature, surrounded by gifts that I need to return. Except the cocktail shaker. That one’s already open and in use.
‘Do you feel like an idiot?’ Verity asks, handing me a drink that’s so pink it could very well be radioactive. She was the first member of the Sister Emergency Service to respond to my text and rush over to my city centre Glasgow flat. I hope she kicked the bin bags containing the last of my short-lived husband’s things on the way in to our marital home. Actually ‘marital home’ is a stretch. It’s my flat, a one bedroom waterfront apartment in an eighties block on the city side of the Clyde, and even though he’s lived with me for the last year or so, I realise now that it always felt like he was just visiting. Maybe that should have been a hint. So, to answer Verity’s question, did I feel like an idiot?
‘No,’ I lie, only to be met with her raised eyebrow of cynicism. I capitulate like an eight year old caught spray-painting the school toilet walls. ‘Okay, of course I do. I mean, even Kim Kardashian’s shortest marriage lasted seventy-two days. It’s a sad day when I make worse life choices than a reality show star who built her career on the size of her arse.’
I take a sip of… ‘What is this?’ I ask, when my taste buds throw their hands up, at a loss as to what they are faced with.
Verity shakes her head, her deep red ponytail swinging as she does so. Even on a Sunday morning, in the midst of this traumatic episode in our family’s history, she still looks great. My elder sister has been on this earth for fourteen months longer than me and something happened in those fourteen months that gave her a level of physical superiority that the rest of us could only aspire to. She’s one of those women who has visible cheekbones and naturally fiery, thick long red hair, so you could pretty much put her through a car wash and she’d come out the other end, sweep her hair up in a messy bun and look fabulous. Even more annoying, she has absolutely no awareness of this. Her appearance and personality are the complete opposite of each other. On the outside, fierce, bold, striking. On the inside, restrained and the most conservative of us all. Now she is shrugging. ‘No idea. I just put a bit of everything in the fridge into the cocktail shaker. There’s gin, cream, raspberry juice, pineapple—’
‘I don’t have pineapple juice,’ I interrupt.
Verity doesn’t break stride. ‘Crushed pineapple from a tin… you’ll find it lurking at the bottom of the glass. Vitamin C has so many benefits…’
‘Will it prevent me marrying dickheads in the future?’
She glides right over that. ‘No, but it does help with the absorption of iron, decreasing blood pressure, combatting heart disease and…’ Off she goes into full education mode. This is what happens when one of your three sisters is a primary school teacher. Not only is she relentlessly organised and can calm a class of stroppy eight year olds with some kind of Jedi mind trick, but she has a remarkable memory for facts and an absolutely pitch-perfect technique for delivering them.
Unfortunately, in this case, her pupil has zoned out. What does it matter what is in there? As long as it contains alcohol that will reduce my feelings of general crapness by even one degree, I’m game.
There’s a crash at the door.
‘What have I missed?’ Yvie wails as she enters the room, balancing several plastic bags and a tray giving off a distinctly ‘lasagne’ aroma on her forearms.
I swallow a slither of pineapple. ‘Just some rampant self-pity, wails of regret and general pathetic wallowing.’
My younger sister nods thoughtfully. ‘All just as expected then. Will lasagne help? Jean, one of the cleaners on the ward, made it. She says it’s her ancient, traditional family recipe, but she’s from Paisley, has no Italian ancestors and has never been further than Great Yarmouth on her holidays, so I have my doubts. In saying that, I’m starting the diet tomorrow, so no point letting this go to waste.’
Dropping the bags on the floor, she wanders out in the direction of the kitchen clutching the lasagne, the stiff blue trousers of her nursing uniform rustling as she goes. The youngest of the four of us, Yvie is a nurse on a geriatric ward at Glasgow Central Hospital. When I’m in my dotage, there’s no one else I want to look after me. Although, I’m hoping that she’ll tend to my every need on the fourteenth deck of a cruise ship floating around the Caribbean, rather than in an aging Victorian building on the edge of the city centre with a bird’s-eye view of the nearby motorway. Still, she loves her job and nursing is what she has always wanted to do. Even when we were kids, she got an undeniable thrill when one of us needed emergency first aid.
I hear the sound of the oven door banging shut, before she re-enters with a glass of radiation pink. ‘I took some of this from the cocktail shaker,’ she informs us. ‘It looks suspiciously like something I’d prescribe for acid reflux. Right, what’s the latest? Married anyone else since I saw you yesterday? Divorced yet? Engaged again?’
I refuse to rise to her innocent-faced sarcasm, instead going for dry threats and indignation. ‘If you carry on like that, I’m going in to work.’
‘It’s Sunday,’ Verity points out, always one to insert facts into the equation.
‘And I