Five on Friday with Faith Hogan @GerHogan

Today I’m delighted to introduce author Faith Hogan. Faith writes women’s fiction which is unashamedly uplifting, feel good and inspiring – something I’m particularly partial to. All of Faith’s books are patiently waiting on my tbr mountain, so I promise to get to them asap Faith. Putting this post together has reminded me of exactly why I bought them.

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Author bio:

Faith Hogan is an award-winning and bestselling author of four novels. Her books have featured as Book Club Favourites, Net Galley Hot Reads and Summer Must Reads.

Faith’s latest book, What Happened To Us? was published in October 2018.

Faith was born in Ireland. She gained an Honours Degree in English Literature and Psychology from Dublin City University and a Postgraduate Degree from University College, Galway.

She is currently working on her next novel. She lives in the west of Ireland with her husband, four children and a very busy Labrador named Penny. She’s a writer, reader, enthusiastic dog walker and reluctant jogger – except of course when it is raining!

So over to Faith:-

Which 5 pieces of music/songs would you include in the soundtrack to your life and why?

This is a tough one… but here we go…

Waterloo – ABBA. This is probably one of the first songs I remember singing loudly at the top of my voice in the back garden when we were kids. In my memory (maybe coloured by imagination) those days were all long and sunny and we wore cotton dresses and sand shoes and ate penny sweets. Our back garden (tiny now) was the place where every kid on our street hung out and we had wonderful adventures with home made tents and a goose that put manners on us if we dared to lose the run of ourselves – ah, yes, happy days indeed!

Love Cats – The Cure. Being young, being in love and believing that you’re invincible and… soul mates!

Nothing Compares To You – Sinead O’Connor. Because everyone has their heart broken once and this was the song that made it all seem so much more poignant.

You’re Just Too Good To Be True – Andy Williams. Getting my mojo back and all the wonderful things life seemed to stack up for me to mend that broken heart.

Il Paradiso – Ennio Morricone. Because when I really did fall in love – it felt like this and everything just fell into place around me like a perfect orchestra with each instrument filling up their sounds perfectly – this is a piece of music that even now makes us (Mr H and I) stop and smile at each other.

Highlight 5 things (apart from family and friends) you’d find it hard to live without.

Penny – our Labrador.

Coffee

Moisturiser / Sunblock!

Reading Glasses for all the books I couldn’t leave behind!

My Lap Top

Can you offer 5 pieces of advice you’d give to your younger self?

The Big one: Don’t Stress!

The next one… No-one else is really watching, so do it anyway!

Number 3 – You’re better than you think at EVERYTHING!

Four: Go for it!

And Finally, Five – Take the time to say hello and goodbye, because you never know…

Tell us 5 things that most people don’t know about you.

I started out writing crime and still take out those old manuscripts now and again and have a little tinker with them, just for fun!

I’m Irish and I don’t drink (alcohol) but I make up for it with vast amounts of coffee.

I usually have three or more books on the go at a time (reading) and one is always a self help book of some sort!

My favourite colour is green – although I’ve tried to talk myself out of it and choose something that doesn’t have forty variations!

I’m a total a sucker for a good face cream!

What are the first 5 things you’d have on your bucket list?

I’d like to see Kenya (perhaps more as it was, than as it is!)

Talk Mr H into a second dog, a pony and two large fat cats all at the same time!

I would like to go back, one day… (when all the kids are finished school!) and do my Phd, but that looks like a long, long way off at this point.

I’d love to have a vintage, smallish motor one day when I don’t need to be carting seven seats about the place and paying road tax that runs to a king’s ransom! I like the idea of setting off on lazy afternoon spins in the country with the hood down and the dog in the back and stopping off at country pubs for afternoon lunches and walks by the sea! (well it is a bucket list!)

Finally, it may be cheating but, I’d like to see a world of equality – where there was no great disparity between rich and poor, men and women and everyone got a fair shot at their life’s dream – that’s the kind of world I’d like to see my kids grow up in!

Thanks so much for taking part Faith. I’m loving the music choices, especially Il Paradiso. You are a woman after my own heart with the face cream – we should swap recommendations ( I think I’ve tried quite a few!). Good advice to your younger self, number 5 is particularly poignant and very good advice for all adults as well. Hope you get to have your second dog, and that Phd sounds like a great plan for the future. As for equality – Amen to that!

Faith’s Books

(Click on image for non affiliated buying link)

What Happened to Us?

Sometimes the end is only the beginning…

After ten years together, Carrie Nolan is devastated when she’s dumped by her hot-shot chef boyfriend, Kevin Mulvey without even a backwards glance! But on reflection, she has sacrificed her own long-term happiness by pandering to his excessive ego in their successful Dublin restaurant (and out of it) – but not anymore!

While Kevin is ‘living the dream’ with his beautiful new Brazilian girlfriend, Carrie seeks solace from a circle of mismatched strangers who need her as much as she needs them.

With Christmas just around the corner, all is not quite as it seems and a catastrophic sequence of events leads to the unthinkable.

How far do you need to fall before you learn the true value of family and friends? And is it ever too late to start again…

The Girl I Used to Know

Amanda King and Tess Cuffe are strangers who share the same Georgian house, but their lives couldn’t be more different.

Amanda seems to have it all, absolute perfection. She projects all the accoutrements of a lady who lunches. Sadly, the reality is a soulless home, an unfaithful husband and a very lonely heart.

By comparison, in the basement flat, unwanted tenant Tess has spent a lifetime hiding and shutting her heart to love.

It takes a bossy doctor, a handsome gardener, a pushy teenager and an abandoned cat to show these two women that sometimes letting go is the first step to moving forward and new friendships can come from the most unlikely situations.

Secrets We Keep

Some people are good at keeping secrets but some secrets are never meant to be kept…

Two distant relatives are drawn together and forced to confront their pasts.

The beautiful old Bath House in Ballytokeep has lain empty and abandoned for decades. For devoted pensioners Archie and Iris, it holds too many conflicting memories of their adolescent dalliances and tragic consequences – sometimes it’s better to leave the past where it belongs.

For highflying, top London divorce lawyer Kate Hunt, it’s a fresh start – maybe even her future. On a winter visit to see her estranged Aunt Iris she falls in love with the Bath House. Inspired, she moves to Ballytokeep leaving her past heartache 600 miles away – but can you ever escape your past or your destiny?

My Husband’s Wives

One man, three wives, too many secrets. A heart-warming story of love, loss, family and friendship. A compelling debut that fans of Freya North will love.

Paul Starr, Ireland’s leading cardiologist dies in a car crash with a pregnant young woman by his side.

United in their grief and the love of one man, four women are thrown together in an attempt to come to terms with life after Paul. They soon realise they never really knew him at all.

The love they shared for Paul in his life and which incensed a feeling of mistrust and dislike for each other, in his death turns into the very thing that bonds them and their children to each other, forever.

As they begin to form unlikely friendships, Paul’s death proves to be the catalyst that enables them to become the people they always wanted to be.