How Not To Shop

Reid Carmen

Description

'I loved her then, I love her now. Annie's back and she's better than ever! Fun, feel good and feisty - Annie Valentine is the woman you want to share a cocktail with!' Portia MacIntosh

Her passion is fashion... but she's on a budget!

Personal shopper Annie Valentine is about to hit the big time: presenting a glamorous TV makeover series! This is it for Annie and her little family. No more scrimping and saving, finally all her hard work has paid off.

But life in the spotlight isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Soon, Annie discovers this is TV on a shoestring and her budget is zip. But more than this, Annie feels as though the women she should be helping to look fabulous, go away feeling all the more like fashion failures!

Can Annie make it in the spotlight? Or will making it big mean losing who she really is?

Fans of Sophie Kinsella, Lindsey Kelk and Paige Toon will love this laugh-out-loud romantic comedy from bestselling author Carmen Reid.

What readers are saying!

"If you love shopping as much as you love a great read, try this. Wonderful." Bestselling author, Katie Fforde

"Annie Valentine is a wonderful character - I want her to burst into my life and sort out my wardrobe for me!" Bestselling author, Jill Mansell

"You will enjoy getting to know Annie Valentine; laughing with her and crying with her. You may even fall in love with her . . . I have! A fantastic read!"⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ Reader review

"Fantastic read, couldn't put it down" ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ Reader review

"Can't wait to read the next one!" ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ Reader review

Sujets

• Vie de famille
• Parentalité et Éducation des Enfants
• Special Interest
• Mashups
• Women
• Motherhood
• Coming of Age
• Humor
• Centro comercial
• Película fotográfica
• Interest group (disambiguation)
• Friendship
• General officer
• Parenting
• Woman
• Marriage
• Fashion
• The Women
• City Life
• General
• Shopping
• Family
• Topic
• Family Life
• Mode (habillement)
• Film

Informations

• Publié par: Boldwood Books
• Date de parution: 30 novembre 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781802805246
• Langue: English

Extrait

HOW NOT TO SHOP


CARMEN REID
ANNIE VALENTINE SERIES

The Personal Shopper
Late Night Shopping
How Not To Shop
Celebrity Shopper
New York Valentine
Shopping With The Enemy
For my lifelong friends, Maggie and Mairi. Here’s to many more long lunches and delightful shopping trips
CONTENTS



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

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Epilogue


More from Carmen Reid

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Also by Carmen Reid

Love Notes

About Boldwood Books
1



Dr Yasmin ‘cosmetologist’ at work:
White cotton coat (medical suppliers)
White gauze mask (same)
Black and pink, silk, high-collared dress
(Alexander McQueen)
Pink peep-toe slingback heels (Christian Louboutin)
Total est. cost: £1,860
‘And how does that feel now?’
‘Just hold nice and still, this is going to be a little uncomfortable.’
Annie’s heart began to pound. When a straight-backed professional in a pristine white coat, paper mask and latex gloves, carrying a syringe, tells you something’s going to be ‘a little uncomfortable’, you know it’s going to hurt like…
‘Nice and still,’ the outrageously expensive Harley Street ‘cosmetologist’ repeated as Annie instinctively nudged her face away from the tip of the needle.
Then yow!! The point was in and she could feel her first ever hit of Botox coursing coolly into the offending frown lines between her eyebrows.
Ouch! Ouch! Ouch! It stung. And it was her brow lines next. There was even less skin up there on her forehead. So that would really smart.
Dr Yasmin’s assistant pressed a tissue to the side of Annie’s face to catch the tears of pain slipping silently from her eyes.
To take her mind from this horror, Annie cast her eyes towards the corner of the room, where four large shopping bags were stacked in a fat heap against a chair.
She hadn’t wanted to let those bags out of her sight and now, just stealing a quick glance at them helped to soothe her. Those four bulging carriers represented something very important. Crucial. Fundamental. Those four glossy bags symbolised the end of her old career and the beginning of a whole shiny, brand new phase.
A veteran of self-improvement, Annie Valentine was about to move onwards and upwards in the best way imaginable. For nine years, she had worked in London’s most glamorous, most high-end fashion emporium, and now she was leaving.



* * *
She had been The Store’s top, best known and most trusted personal shopper. She had shopped for, styled and ‘made over’ women from every walk of life. In short, there was nothing about fashion or buying clothes that Annie didn’t know. In several swift minutes, Annie could size you up from head to toe and teach you more about what shapes, sizes, colours and styles you should be wearing than all that time spent schlepping hopelessly in and out of changing rooms could ever do.
Working for The Store had transformed Annie over the years too. The hair in her tight, high ponytail had become longer and blonder. Her figure, slightly too short and slightly too curvy for her liking, had been lifted and lengthened with expensive high heels, ramrod posture and a hefty dose of Lycra in all the right places. Now that she was in her… erm … late-thirties, she was at Dr Yasmin’s because she wasn’t going to let some pesky little frown lines give the game away.
Annie knew she was leaving more than just a job. Over those nine years, The Store had become her second home. When she’d lost her husband, Roddy, she’d been able to lose herself in The Store; when she’d struggled to meet the school fees for her two children, her clients from The Store had rallied round to give her extra out-of-hours work. Even the new man in her life, Ed, though he understood not one shred about fashion, understood completely the importance of The Store in Annie’s life.
But now she was really, properly going to leave! Leave her job and her monthly commission (not to mention her regular bonuses for best saleswoman) and her hugely tempting staff discount (the kind of discount which meant there were labels she could previously only have dreamed about hanging in her wardrobe) and the staff who had become best friends.
Annie was about to walk away from it all because she had been offered the perhaps once-in-a-lifetime chance to become a real, live TV STAR. Oh yes! She still had to pinch herself to believe it.
After three auditions and two screen tests, finally, the call had come. Now Annie and her ridiculously wealthy client-turned-friend, Svetlana Wisneski, were going to be the makeover gurus on a new Channel Five show, Wonder Women .
Well, OK, to be honest, Annie wasn’t wildly enthusiastic about the series name either, but maybe there was still time for a rethink.
The shopping bags in the corner of Dr Yasmin’s office contained the framework of the TV presenter wardrobe Annie had bought for herself today in a six-hour non-stop retail session.
Inside the bags – two from The Store, one from Prada and one from H&M – was the culmination of nine years of shopping expertise.
In expectation of the money she was about to earn, Annie had allowed herself to buy several amazing treasures, like the complicated ankle boots from the best shoemaker in London and the jewelled, leather, long-lace sandals by inimitable Miu Miu.
Then there were slightly more practical items: scoop-necked tops, beads and bracelets from H&M, a pair of vibrant, stretchy dresses by her favourite American designer and two architectural, nipped-in jackets: Vivienne Westwood, no less.
She’d also chosen sling-backed, red patent pumps for walking briskly from shop to shop with the women she’d be making over, and an extravagant blue, creamily soft, Chloé silk shirt.
But the most wonderful purchase of all was the Prada skirt wrapped up in layers of tissue paper as carefully as a museum exhibit. The kind of skirt that you didn’t get your hands on just by turning up at the Prada shop and hoping for the best. No way. She’d been on the waiting list for this pleated, crinkled, dip-dyed fashion masterpiece for seven weeks, knowing full well it would fly out of the doors without ever hitting a hanger.
Everything she’d bought was vibrant and colourful because she knew television drank in colour and she suspected that the women she’d be making over would be dressed in the dowdy, sludgy colours of the under-confident or fashion-inexperienced.
The shopping trip had cost… well… including the Jimmy Choo ankle boots… Oh. My. Lord. Just over £5,000. Then the Botox with snazzy Dr Yaz, another £700. Ouch.
The man in her life, Ed, had warned her. He’d told her not to get too carried away with the TV presenter preparations until she knew exactly how much money she was going to be paid and exactly how long the job would go on for. But it had been hard not to get very, very excited. Channel Five! And had the producer, Donnie (‘call me Finn’) Finnigan, not told her over and over again how much ‘potential’ he could ‘sense’ in Wonder Women ?
Filming was due to start in just a few weeks, so really she had to have something to wear. Finn was just waiting to ‘hear the final details’ of ‘the commission’ and he’d promised to get back to Svetlana and Annie this afternoon. Just as soon as Dr Yaz had finished with her instruments of torture, Annie was going to meet Svetlana, so that they could be together when the news arrived.
‘Come to my house,’ Svetlana had commanded on the phone in her rich and melodious Eastern European-beauty-meets-serious-Mayfair-millions accent.
‘Your house?’ Annie had echoed with surprise. Although for six years now, Svetlana had rarely bought so much as a belt without Annie’s advice, this was Annie’s first ever invitation to Svetlana’s four-storey, prime Belgravia Divorce Settlement AKA home.
But they would be working together now. Annie was no longer a member of Svetlana’s service personnel: she was on the verge of becoming her colleague, her slightly more equal – her friend, even? It was interesting new territory. At least in the old roles, they’d both known exactly where they were: Svetlana, the ex-wife of two multi-millionaires and one billionaire, and Annie her trusted personal shopper in London. Obviously, there was another personal shopper in Paris, one in New York and one who was a little under-used in Moscow.
‘And how does that feel now?’ Dr Yasmin asked, bringing Annie back to the moment.
Although the real answer was: Like you’re sticking a long, sharp needle into my forehead! Annie managed a more polite, ‘Just fine,’ as the assistant continued to dab at her trickling tears.
Ed would never approve of what she was doing here. Very sweetly, he always told her he loved her just the way she was. Although, honestly, he had no idea. She shuddered to think what she would really look like if she stopped waxing, plucking, highlighting, manicuring, applying make-up and dressing with care, wearing tight Lycra and concentrating.
If he ever found out about the Botox, not to mention the shopping spree, he’d have one of his rare, but nevertheless unpleasant, freakouts. But there was no need for him to find out, was there? She kept her own severely stressed credit cards well away from his gaze and stored the paperless statements and invoices carefully online. Plus, apparently men never, ever noticed when you’d had Botox. This was something she was doing,