If, like me, you’ve ever longed for a romantic heroine who didn’t have perfect skin, an exciting job in the city, hardly any flaws and was totally lovely but inexplicably couldn’t find anyone to love her, then it might be time to download Five Go Glamping and escape to the countryside for a few hours.
Festival tickets
Double check best Instagram filter
Avoid thinking about work/Connor/five year plan!!
A four day break from her hectic life to relax in the countryside and hang out at a local festival (for free!) is just what Fiona Delaney needs. With her best friends, great tunes and a cool looking hat her Instagram shots are going to look A-Mazing!
Until suddenly glamping starts to feel a lot more like camping and Fiona’s in desperate search of a comfy chair, wi-fi and a chilled glass of wine. But when she finally makes it to the local pub she discovers this trip could be more than just a holiday, it might just change her life forever…
Fiona Delaney may be a city girl but her job’s not remotely exciting, although she does her best to make the most of it with her wicked sense of mischief aimed perpetually at her colleagues, and Doris, in particular. Having taken the job hoping to move into something more challenging, which has never happened, her stop-gap has become her career and she’s shocked to discover how long it’s been that way and that it’s not quite as senior as she’d hoped. All is not lost though because… Fiona has a plan. Oh yes, a Five-Year Plan to be exact. She likes to plan, plan to the extent of it being a problem. Miss Spontaneity she is not. But if she’s working towards her plan, even though she’s not quite where she hoped to be by now, her life’s on track, right?
Well, you’ll have to see what you think about her situation but friends Steph and Sinead think she could do with a break at the very least, so when the latter scores them a free glamping weekend away, Fiona is persuaded that it might be just what she needs. Change of scene, some of the comforts of home, and distance put between her and the not-as-attentive-as-he-should-be boyfriend, Connor. The three friends are joined by Kirk and his new sidekick, Brian Harvey, who is completely adorable and who you will love.
Of course, for someone like Fiona, who likes to plan and research everything, this trip was never going to be smooth sailing anyway but the OCD planner needs to relax and loosen up. Her sharp observations provide for a lot of the humour in the book, as does the reality of the promised weekend in the country. But behind the humorous situations is a great deal of affection too and I enjoyed the interactions between the group of friends which felt real and all too human. Each is a distinctive character, and there are bound to be tensions between them on a trip like this. It’s not some wafty, floaty, rose-tinted glamping trip; this is the reality of a bunch of friends going away together and camping in a field with patchy wifi and no shops nearby. Rural idyll it is not, even on first sight, and these tensions in the group do further the plot by giving Fiona time away to spend with Brian, and separating everyone giving them the opportunity to do their own thing, which I thought was likely and necessary. But you know that these friends have their hearts in the right place and have brought Fiona here for her own good.
Five Go Glamping has a terrific relatable heroine who’s stuck in a rut at work and at home. Fiona Delaney’s plan might not be working but she does have a cutting sense of humour and more resourcefulness that she realises and, with such a great group of friends around her, she might just discover that letting loose in the country is exactly what she needs. And that’s when she might start having as much fun as the reader who goes glamping with her and her friends. This was a fun and fast, refreshingly different read about friendship, life, our perceptions and prejudices of other people, and how easily we can get stuck in a life that isn’t making us happy, and what we can do about it.
Five Go Glamping by Liz Tipping is published as an ebook by Carina, an imprint of Harper Collins. It is currently available from Amazon UK, GooglePlay, iTunes and Kobo for only 99p. You can find out more about Liz and her books on her Facebook page Lizzie’s Books or on Twitter. I received a copy of the ebook for review from the publisher through NetGalley but have since bought my own copy to keep.
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