Works

Reviews in the press

"Rosy Thornton's endearing novel about a middle-aged woman's French odyssey is the nearest thing to meeting a whole new set of friends... learning about their lives, their loves, their hopes and their fears. With her gentle and understated prose, playful humour and charming and affectionate portrayal of our laid back neighbours, Thornton provides a delightful snapshot of the French way of life and the universal emotions... The secret of Thornton's success is her ability to tap into the concerns of real people and build up a story and a dialogue that is both credible and entertaining. An intelligent and warm-hearted read." - Lancashire Evening Post

"There's so much to enjoy in this book. Catherine is a sympathetic character and I loved all the detail of her life in La Grelaudière... Catherine's friendships with her neighbours are so realistic. This is not a novel in the posh-Londoner-goes-native-in-France-or-Italy-with-comical-villagers style. Catherine's tact and her obvious talent with the needle are crucial in making a success of her new life. The steps by which Madame Bouschet and Madame Parkstone become Marie-Josèphe and Catherine, true friends, are portrayed with almost Victorian restraint and delicacy. Catherine's relationship with Patrick is similarly restrained... It's like a slow medieval dance, coming together then moving apart. The Tapestry of Love is a really satisfying book... I'm pleased to be able to recommend it so highly." - I Prefer Reading

"We are in the Cévennes, a remote and rugged mountain region in the centre of France, and... from page one, we are plunged into this strange, beautiful but fierce landscape in a strongly visual way. The transhumance comes around and around, to mark the passage of the seasons, and the sense of assimilation into a place and a culture, in this beguiling and beautiful novel... There is the joy of the landscape - beautiful but wild, difficult, hard, with its extremes of weather, shifts in mood, light and shadow as the sun barely lifts itself above the mountains. The description of it is full of detail that is almost panoramic: colour, contour, climate, plants, animals and terrain. Rosy's knowledge and deep love for this landscape and its active participation almost as another character are part of the reason The Tapestry of Love is, in my opinion, her best novel yet... With each one, her voice and her art have become more confident and assured. There is emotional intelligence and empathy in the writing, combined with shafts of humour and a lightness of touch... She has taken the risk of describing a landscape and a community that is entirely and spectacularly unique and all-encompassing, has succeeded in weaving a story through it that is rooted in it and worthy of it, and in doing so, has written a novel that is wise, warm, rich and immensely satisfying." - Vulpes Libris

"Catherine is a wonderful character and well written. She stayed with me after I finished the book - that's always the test of a really good character... 'A Year in Provence' tempted a lot of people to move to the area and is credited by some with the start of the tourist boom which ruined the region for those who lived there. 'The Tapestry of Love' will not do the same to the Cévennes. The beauty is there and the grandeur of the landscape but there's realism in the picture... You might have guessed by now that I really enjoyed the book. 4.5/5 stars." - The Bookbag

"I feel as though I've spent the last few days on holiday in France, so vividly does Rosy Thornton describe the landscape of the Cévennes and the mountain hamlet of La Grelaudière in her new novel The Tapestry of Love. It shows a great sense of place and a feel for the area and its people. This is a sensuous book with - as you might expect from a novel set in France - food a significant ingredient, and that's something I love to read about in fiction. Rosy is such an easy writer to read - relaxed, fluent, intelligent, she tells her stories with natural grace and in doing so she 'simply' entertains you. Her characters are human, their predicaments believable, and although the protagonists have downs as well as ups, the reader knows they are in safe hands. Put all that together and this warm, romantic novel is a treat." - Cornflower

"It's very good. Just the sort of book to read in a deck chair on a hot summer's day - with or without - a bottle of wine." - Jilly Sheep

"While reading this book I felt I was living in France. It's such a treat to read what you might call 'light literature for intelligent readers' that I'm already seeking out Rosy Thornton's earlier books and looking forward to the next one. Highly recommended for summer reading." - Life Must be Filled Up

"This is a quiet, deeply-experienced novel. There is grief, sadness and regret but also joy in Catherine's growing appreciation of her place in the landscape, its tastes, smells, sounds and its traditions. And there's also humour, from Catherine's exasperations with French bureaucracy to the eccentricities of some of the locals. But this is no Peter-Mayle-type English patronisation of the 'funny French'. There is warmth and understanding of the lifestyle. The evocative descriptions of autumn rain in the woods, the unfurling trees in spring, the drone of bees, the making of honey, the heart-stopping glimpse of a wild boar and her family, the invigorating, yet exhausting slog driving sheep up to their summer grazing, all reveal a novelist at the height of her powers. It's subtle and deeply-felt and a joy from start to finish." - The Elephant in the Writing Room

"The thing I loved about this novel (and Rosy Thornton's other two novels as well) is the way she can take an everyday sort of life and expand it into a wonderful, meaningful story. After all, Catherine isn't all that different from me, really - she has grown children she misses, an ailing mum she worries about, an avocation turning into a career. Yet in Thornton's hands, Catherine's story becomes compelling and thought provoking. I think it's Thornton's intimate writing style, the perfect amount of attention to the small detail, and her deft characterizations that make her novels such a joy to read." - Bookstack

"What I found so enjoyable about the novel - apart, obviously, from the twists and turns of the relationships - was the way Rosy Thornton dealt with Catherine's experiences of her solitary life in the French mountains... Will she stick it out? Or will it just be a temporary experience to be notched up and treasured? Read it and find out." - Harriet Devine's Blog

"It's that time of year again, the papers are full of summer reading suggestions. Well, everyone can stop talking about it now, because I think I've just found the perfect summer book... This book isn't just another English-woman-struggles-with-French-life novel. Rosy Thornton instead makes Catherine's occasional travails humorous without mocking anyone, and the result is a warm, affectionate, and gentle story that manages to be simple and easy to read without insulting anyone's intelligence... Yes, perfect summer reading. A simple, straight-forward story, but written so very well. It's gentle and lovely but still compelling... and what's more, it's made me want to keep bees." - Other Stories