Product Description

William and Amy Ashurst are typical townies, dedicated professionals at the top of their tree, with two adorable children and an au pair who cooks, cleans and cares for them all. Then one day Will collapses on his way into work and he decides he’s never going back. So it is that, three months later, Amy is standing outside Helmshill Grange, a sullen monstrosity of a house, deep in the Yorkshire moors, with their own land as far as the eye can see. It’s what William says he’s always wanted. Then tragedy strikes and Amy learns that it's one thing living the dream, but when the dream is not your own, how long can it last?

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #4775 in Books
• Published on: 2009-09-03
• Binding: Paperback
• 416 pages

About the Author
Carole Matthews is an internationally bestselling author and her unique sense of humour has won her legions of fans and critical acclaim throughout the world. Carole has presented on television and is a regular radio guest. When she is not writing novels and television scripts she manages to find time to trek in the Himalayas, rollerblade in Central Park, take tea in China and snooze in her garden shed in Milton Keynes.

Customer Reviews

Another Fantastic Read from a Brilliant Writer!
I've just finished The Difference a Day Makes and was torn between wanting to know how it ended and NOT wanting the book to come to an end! Yet again, Carole Matthews has written a story filled with characters I really cared about and a plot that I found both believable and fascinating. To see how Amy Ashurst adapts to life in the Yorkshire countryside, especially after such a tragic turn of events in her life, was both realistic and heartrending at the same time. I found myself laughing and crying in the space of two pages - and the scene at the funeral with their troublesome hound Hamish, was pure brilliance! I thought it was going to prove too heartbreaking and tragic to bear, but Carole knows just how to offset one set of emotions against another. I honestly enjoyed this book SO much and it gave me some much-needed escapism at a pretty rotten time in my own life. I've since bought a load more of Carole's books - she's a genius and one of the best writers around today. Keep up the good work Carole - can't wait for your next book to come out!

Not the Chocolate Lovers theme but great all the same
I have been a huge fan of the "chocolate lovers" books and although this wasn't quite as good it was a great read all the same. This is about Amy and Will who are out and out townies. Will has an "incident" and ends up moving him and Amy and their two children out to the sticks to start a better life. When tragedy strikes Amy is thrown in at the deep end on her own with two children, a bunch of farmers that consider her an outsider and trouble filled animals. An amusing and warm story that is easy reading.

Living a dream
Amy and Will move to a run down house miles from anywhere. They both work in television and have two small children but when Will has serious chest pains and collapses he decides they need to slow down and get out of the rat race. Amy isn't too sure about moving so far away from London - rural domesticity isn't her dream - but she's worried about Will's health so she reluctantly agrees. This book is the story of what happens after they move and how Will's dream becomes Amy's nightmare.

I did not find this book as enjoyable as this author's two Chocolate Lovers books. It did not feel as polished as some of her previous work has done and it reads more like a series of incidents thrown together to make a story. There are some amusing moments - especially involving the dog Hamish - and there are some poignant episodes. Overall I found it too sentimental and slushy two qualities which have not been a feature of her previous books.

I'm sure it will delight Carole Matthews' regular readers but as far as I was concerned it was not up to her usual standard. I just did not care about Amy enough to want to know what happened to her. I did read all of it but was not completely convinced by the ending either.