Books : Fiction : Contemporary Fiction: 1970 Onwards : Authors A-Z : C : Colgan, Jenny

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Operation Sunshine

Jenny Colgan
Do You Remember the First Time?

Jenny Colgan
Where Have All the Boys Gone?

Jenny Colgan
Looking for Andrew McCarthy

Jenny Colgan

Travelling East across the United States in a silver Thunderbird, Ellie Eversholt is a woman on a mission. She's Looking for Andrew McCarthy, and hoping that when she finds him she can ask him a few pertinent questions, such as why, at the grand old age of 30, life hasn't turned out the way it was portrayed in the Brat Pack films of the 1980s.
Feeling misled by the glittering façade presented to her in the dimly-lit cinemas of her teenage years, bored with her career, fed-up with her failing love life and ashamed that at 30 she's still renting a room in a flat owned by Big Bastard, the Neanderthal flatmate-from-hell, Ellie needs some answers--and she needs them now. Gathering up a group of similarly disillusioned friends, Ellie makes her way to America, and together they set off, Thelma and Louise-style (except without the cliff-ending suicide pact) to criss-cross America in search of 80s screen idol Andrew McCarthy. In a tale which explores every avenue of the old saying "it is better to travel hopefully than to arrive", Ellie and friends on both sides of the Atlantic share in the joys and disappointments of her quest: a journey which takes her to the four corners of the States and brings her into contact with a variety of outrageous characters, ranging from hunky tanned scriptwriters to six foot tall transvestites and even Frosty II, the world's largest pig.
Does she find the real Andrew McCarthy? And will she ever come to terms with why she hasn't spent her life living in a huge apartment with billowing curtains, wearing a big pink dress and being dated by a succession of handsome men, like a modern-day Molly Ringwald? --Emily Lowson
Talking to Addison

Jenny Colgan

Jenny Colgan's second novel Talking to Addison arrives with a flourish following the success of her debut Amanda's Wedding. Sharp, quirky one-liners complement merciless observations of human foibles and the London scene to make this romantic comedy a cut above the rest.
The story opens with the modern-day heroine Holly trapped in the flatshare from hell with members of "Scary Clean Freaks Incorporated", ruled by the obnoxious Carol who "dispensed ... Robert de Niro-to-doomed gangster stares". Even when Holly escapes the suburban inquisition, life still isn't a bed of roses: she's an unemployed florist, in love with a recluse and she's being bullied. She's in good company though when she moves in with a bunch of equally maladjusted misfits: Josh, a terminally nice boy, has issues; Kate, the high-flying and no-nonsense career girl, wilts every time a married man comes along and then there's Addison--the drop-dead-gorgeous lodger ("Johnny Depp in geek form")--who never leaves his room, already has a girlfriend (albeit over the Internet) and is a certified Trekkie fan.
With Talking to Addison, Colgan ties together her comedic talents with her flair for storytelling to create an offbeat, hilarious tale about an ordinary girl's search for Mr Right with the inevitable Mr Oddballs getting in the way. --Nicola Perry
Scottish Girls About Town
West End Girls

Jenny Colgan
Amanda's Wedding

Jenny Colgan

90s girl-about-town Mel is adjusting to life without posh-boy Alex, whose attempts to make it big in the music biz have propelled him to the land of the free and Bruce Springsteen. Having omitted to mention his grand tour to Mel however, he has left our heroine a tad disturbed--grounds indeed for taking comfort in the arms of smelly, over-sized accountants with juvenile tendencies. Alex's emotional return coincides with the news that Mel's old "friend" Amanda, social-climber pas excellent (sic), has succeeded in getting herself hitched to Scottish laird Fraser for whom Mel has long harboured feelings of an X-rated nature. Before long, Fraser's brother Angus and Mel's friend Fran--an evil-mouthed, scary, man-hater--join forces in an attempt to rescue the scruffy Scot from the talons of the wannabe "It" girl, whose only interests lie in a double-barrelled aristo title and an ancestral pile.
Amanda's Wedding flies riotously through the pre-nuptial rituals of stag and hen nights and disastrous dinner parties to a staggering, if inevitable, wedding day from hell. Colgan's merciless observations of the London social scene are as witty and sharp as her take on the (extra)ordinary lives of middle-class brunettes from Woking. "Four Weddings and a Funeral" meets "Boys Behaving Badly"--and what is flat-mate Linda's, dark (and milk), cacao-based secret? --Carey Green
The Boy I Loved Before

Jenny Colgan
Amanda's Wedding

Jenny Colgan

90s girl-about-town Mel is adjusting to life without posh-boy Alex, whose attempts to make it big in the music biz have propelled him to the land of the free and Bruce Springsteen. Having omitted to mention his grand tour to Mel however, he has left our heroine a tad disturbed--grounds indeed for taking comfort in the arms of smelly, over-sized accountants with juvenile tendencies. Alex's emotional return coincides with the news that Mel's old "friend" Amanda, social-climber pas excellent (sic), has succeeded in getting herself hitched to Scottish laird Fraser for whom Mel has long harboured feelings of an X-rated nature. Before long, Fraser's brother Angus and Mel's friend Fran--an evil-mouthed, scary, man-hater--join forces in an attempt to rescue the scruffy Scot from the talons of the wannabe "It" girl, whose only interests lie in a double-barrelled aristo title and an ancestral pile.
Amanda's Wedding flies riotously through the pre-nuptial rituals of stag and hen nights and disastrous dinner parties to a staggering, if inevitable, wedding day from hell. Colgan's merciless observations of the London social scene are as witty and sharp as her take on the (extra)ordinary lives of middle-class brunettes from Woking. "Four Weddings and a Funeral" meets "Boys Behaving Badly"--and what is flat-mate Linda's, dark (and milk), cacao-based secret? --Carey Green
Operation Sunshine

Jenny Colgan
Working Wonders

Jenny Colgan

Jenny Colgan has carved out some highly individual territory as a writer of great warmth and humour; she is a clear-eyed observer of human nature, as ready to extend sympathy to her characters as she is to be sardonic about their foibles. With Working Wonders, this brand of humorous writing is satisfyingly in evidence once more, wedded this time to a complex and intriguing plot.
Arthur Pendleton has led an unexciting life, working as a town planner and slowly realising that his life holds few surprises. Then he encounters the head of a team of management consultants, the beguiling and beautiful Gwyneth Morgan, a woman Arthur finds himself intimidated by. Her job is to inspire Arthur and his ill-assorted team of planners to take on a daunting task--ensure that Coventry becomes the new European city of culture. Looking around at such colleagues as nerdish computer expert Sven and the unhappy (and long-suffering) Cathy, Arthur becomes increasingly dispirited. And then, astonishingly, Gwyneth shows signs of being attracted to him, and (even more surprisingly) his team begins to fire on all cylinders with ideas. But which is more achievable: beginning a relationship with the intriguing Gwyneth, or making Coventry appear interesting? The elements that made Jenny Colgan's earlier books bestsellers are firmly in place here: quirkily observed characters, capricious plotting and a truly involving sense of the way in which most of us live our lives. Both Arthur and Gwyneth are beautifully drawn, and even if the basic theme (dull hero and brighter heroine in a non-metropolitan culture clash) may owe something to David Lodge's Changing Places, it's none the worse for that; this is an enchanting read. --Barry Forshaw
Diamonds are a Girl's Best Friend

Jenny Colgan
Diamonds are a Girl's Best Friend

Jenny Colgan
Scottish Girls about Town: And Sixteen Other Scottish Women Authors

Jenny Colgan, Isla Dewar, Muriel Gray
Operation Sunshine

Jenny Colgan
AMANDA'S WEDDING.

Jenny. Colgan
Talking to Addison

Jenny Colgan
Talking to Addison

Jenny Colgan

Jenny Colgan's second novel Talking to Addison arrives with a flourish following the success of her debut Amanda's Wedding. Sharp, quirky one-liners complement merciless observations of human foibles and the London scene to make this romantic comedy a cut above the rest.
The story opens with the modern-day heroine Holly trapped in the flatshare from hell with members of "Scary Clean Freaks Incorporated", ruled by the obnoxious Carol who "dispensed ... Robert de Niro-to-doomed gangster stares". Even when Holly escapes the suburban inquisition, life still isn't a bed of roses: she's an unemployed florist, in love with a recluse and she's being bullied. She's in good company though when she moves in with a bunch of equally maladjusted misfits: Josh, a terminally nice boy, has issues; Kate, the high-flying and no-nonsense career girl, wilts every time a married man comes along and then there's Addison--the drop-dead-gorgeous lodger ("Johnny Depp in geek form")--who never leaves his room, already has a girlfriend (albeit over the Internet) and is a certified Trekkie fan.
With Talking to Addison, Colgan ties together her comedic talents with her flair for storytelling to create an offbeat, hilarious tale about an ordinary girl's search for Mr Right with the inevitable Mr Oddballs getting in the way. --Nicola Perry
West End Girls

Jenny Colgan