Divas Don't Knit

Divas Don't Knit by Gil McNeil

(It looks like this book'll be published stateside as The Beach Street Knitting Society and Yarn Club in March 2009)

Jo Mackenzie needs a new start. Newly widowed with two young sons and a perilous bank balance, she has to leave London to take over her grandmother's wool shop. They arrive in the pouring rain and Broadgate Bay is the kind of Kentish seaside town where the tide went out a long time ago and the dusty old shop is full of peach four-ply. Marmalade mohair, an A-list actress moving into the local mansion and a 'Stitch and Bitch' group will help, but it's not going to be easy. Very large dogs, celebrity, small town intrigues, packed lunches and romance all loom large in Gil McNeil's funny and uplifting novel. Divas Don't Knit turns prejudices and assumptions upside down and tells it how it really is in the world of knit-one, purl-one. Knitting has never been so much fun.

I enjoyed this book very much and I don't think that you need to be a knitter to enjoy it (though if you don't like "women's fiction", you may want to steer clear of it).

Divas Don't Knit is a heartwarming tale. Our protagonist overcomes the loss of her husband and way of life, but in the end rediscovers herself and in the process creates a life filled with family, friends, and community, completely different than her old life, but better.

I'd definitely be interested in reading the sequel, Needles and Purls.