The Keeper of Stories: The most charming and uplifting novel you will read this year!

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So why only three stars? Because I found the main character, Janice, pretty annoying and clueless. She is portrayed as a smart middle aged woman, but her actions are all on the contrary: she stays with her freeloading husband, she doesn't stand her ground with people that push her around, and miraculously, she is friends with many of her clients. Having said that - and if you are prepared to get past this - the stories are nice and the dialogues with the dog made me smile all the time. She can’t recall what started her collection. Maybe it was in a fragment of conversation overheard as she cleaned a sink? Before long (as she dusted a sitting room or defrosted a fridge) she noticed people were telling her their stories. Perhaps they always had done, but now it is different, now the stories are reaching out to her and she gathers them to her... Absolutely spellbinding...a warm-hearted, thoughtful, funny and yet deeply poignant’ Celia Anderson, author of 59 Memory Lane The cover is simply gorgeous. If they make all book covers so delightful, I’ll have a tough time stopping books from entering my TBR mountain. After studying history at university, Sally moved to London to work in advertising. In her spare time she studied floristry at night school and eventually opened her own flower shop. Sally came to appreciate that flower shops offer a unique window into people’s stories and she began to photograph and write about this floral life in a series of non-fiction books. Later, she continued her interest in writing when she founded her fountain pen company, Plooms.co.uk.

She can’t recall what started her collection. Maybe it was in a fragment of conversation overheard as she cleaned a sink? Before long (as she dusted a sitting room or defrosted a fridge) she noticed people were telling her their stories. Perhaps they always had done, but now it is different, now the stories are reaching out to her and she gathers them to her… This book was a different read to my normal, but i loved it, ir reminded me of my childhood when my dada would make up stories of Hobgoblins and leprechauns in the woods..... MY THOUGHTS: I love to sit in cafès listening to the conversations going on around me. Sometimes it's amazing what you overhear. That may be why this book really resonated with me. Janice and I have a lot in common. We both collect stories, although she is far better at it than I am. And my practice husband, as I like to refer to him, and her husband Mike, could be twins. Janice is a cleaner, she's married to Mike and they have a grown up son Simon. Janice spends her days catching buses, cleaning people’s houses, some of her customers are nice to her and others don’t consider she’s a human being and has feelings.We are introduced to our lead, Janice. A cleaner who goes about her days working within the houses for her regulars. Janice loves her regular clients; apart from one couple, “Mrs YeahYeahYeah” & “Mr NoNoNotNow”. Most of her regulars know nothing about her and Janice continues to listen & collect their stories. Never asking for more, never sharing her own. Her husband knows very little about her and is so self-absorbed that Janice feels she isn’t seen. Blending in, Janice likes it this way. Until one day, she doesn’t. Do you think this book presents an accurate representation of life for some people in our society today?

Absolutely spellbinding...a warm-hearted, thoughtful, funny and yet deeply poignant' Celia Anderson, author of 59 Memory Lane This is a wonderful story and beautifully written, It’s an extremely easy read and one that you will not want to put down. Mrs B is no fool and knows there is more to Janice than meets the eye. What is she hiding? After all, doesn't everyone have a story to tell?Cleaner Janice knows that it is in people's stories that you really get to know them. From recently-widowed Fiona and her son Adam; to opera-singing Geordie; and the awful Mrs "YeahYeahYeah" and her fox terrier, Janice has a unique insight into the community around her. When Janice starts cleaning for Mrs B - a shrewd woman in her nineties - she finally meets someone who wants to hear her story. But Janice doesn't have a story to share. Mrs B is no fool and knows there's more to Janice than meets the eye. What is Janice hiding? So begins a charming tale that shows us how literature (and dogs) can bring people together and enrich their lives-and that sometimes the people you are overlooking can have QUITE an interesting story to tell! Janice is an extraordinary cleaner. She really cares for her clients and spends time ensuring their needs are met with barely a thought for her own. She’s a collector of stories and shares fragments of them with us as we read on. But her own story? That is a deep, dark secret that she can’t bring herself to share. Her life begins to change when she meets Mrs B, a cantankerous nonagenarian with an interesting story of her own. At its heart this is a story of friendship and it’s really rather magnificent. My thanks to HarperCollins UK Audio and NetGalley for the ALC of “The Keeper of Stories”. This review is voluntary and contains my honest opinion about the audiobook.

This is a life-affirming book in which ordinary people each have their own story that will resonate with the reader. These ordinary stories are not usually heard but here they are told with such empathy and understanding that you feel you really know the characters and become absorbed in their lives and what happens to them. I have read this book three times now and I find new insights on each reading. I recommend this book highly and look forward to further books by this author. AnneH, 9 March 2022 Geordie– a famous opera singer who, aptly, hails from Newcastle. He admires Janice both as his cleaner, and as a woman. Absolutely spellbinding…Warm-hearted, thoughtful, funny, and yet deeply poignant.” – Celia Anderson, author of 59 Memory Lane I remember being told the craft of simple writing begins with short sentences because you learn to get the message across in fewer words in a way that is succinct and direct. The problem with the book style is the sentences were all good practice, in theory, but they did not flow, felt disconnected and refrained from describing anything. So it was difficult to get in the mood of the book. These adverts enable local businesses to get in front of their target audience – the local community.In part, this book has been inspired by her own love of stationery, which started in her childhood. ‘I have particular memories of new crayons, pencil cases, and exercise books at the beginning of the school year. These gave me a huge amount of pleasure – as did playing Post Offices when I was little.’ This is such a character driven tale and testament to the writing, I was not confused once as to who was who. The care that Janice provides to each of her clients is special - just like she is. There are some wonderful characters but it would be remiss of me not to give a big shout out to Mrs B and Decius the swearing fox-terrier. As Janice cleans and cares, she collects the essence of conversations she hears - some are special and many are very funny - but all very believable and relatable. This book is a debut novel. It was an enjoyable and lovely read. The main character Janice is a cleaner who is likeable and has ‘collected’ stories, that are other peoples. I fell in live with Janice almost straight away. This is a beautifully written book. Janice's life stories are gleaned from the clients that she cleans for. She cares about her clients and their stories but we don't know much about Janice, but she does have a deep dark secret that she's unwilling to share. This is a character driven story. This book wasn't quite what I was expecting, it was much better. There are some fascinating characters in the book, almost all of whom are Janice’s clients or their family members. There’s Fiona, a grieving widow, and her teenaged son Adam who is still learning to face life without his father. There’s Geordie Bowman, a rich and famous opera singer with a generous heart. There’s Mrs. YeahYeahYeah and her husband Mr. NoNoNotNow, thus named by Janice for their catchphrase. But no character is as wonderful as their fox terrier Decius. The way the author has brought Decius to life is so brilliant, you won’t help but fall in love with him and his f-bombs. ( Oh yeah, a dog who cusses! 😂) Janice herself is pretty well-sketched, what with her love for books and her constant worries about things both great and small. She comes across as a really interesting character.

Another key theme in The Keeper Of Stories is friendship. As Max and Emilia travel through Deltora, they form strong bonds with the people they meet along the way and rely on each other for emotional support. This reinforces the importance of friendship as a source of strength and comfort in difficult times. The characters' journeys and struggles are both heartbreaking and inspiring, making it a truly moving read.I listen to the quiet voices.” Janice stops and looks at him. “What do you mean?” “I figured out long ago that if I listen to the few people who shout at me, I am making them more important than they are. What they say will stay with me, upset me, and those loud voices will go on and on, even when the shouting has stopped. So instead I listen very carefully for the quiet voices - which is most people. The people who teach a perfect lesson with nobody knowing.” Her love of all things writing continues with Plooms (plooms.co.uk) her online fountain pen company, which Sally started when she couldn’t find a pen she wanted to buy. ‘I write with a fountain pen all the time; I love the sound it makes on the paper,’ she tells me. ‘In The Book of Beginnings, I’ve just written about what I know, and I know about selling fountain pens. I also wanted to say something about the joy of writing in ink. This does permeate the book.’ Then there Janice’s own story - and she does have a story - but has hidden it away. Digging deeper you can see that topics such as suicide, our treatment of the elderly and alcoholism are sensitively handled with this book offering varying degrees of depth and sentiment but all up providing such truth through its tender writing. You will be cheering loudly for Janice and dearly hope she gets her happily ever after from a past that has confined and defined her for too long. Life-affirming, hopeful fiction that can definitely fit into the ‘Uplit’ genre, this wonderful novel will definitely be on my list of ‘Best Books of 2022’. Highly recommended! THE AUTHOR: After studying history at university, I moved to London to work in advertising. However, in my spare time I studied floristry at night school and eventually opened my own flower shop. I soon came to appreciate that flower shops offer a unique window into people’s stories and eventually I began to photograph and write about this floral life in a series of non-fiction books. Later, I continued my interest in writing when I founded my fountain pen company, Plooms.co.uk.