A popular TV and radio personality, Amanda is a regular panellist on Channel 5’s Jeremy Vine show, as well as featuring on numerous daytime ITV programmes. She also makes countless guest appearances on national and independent radio stations, including LBC and talkRADIO, where she is well known for her insightful observations and infectious humour.
2021. The last thirty-seven years have not been easy for Bess. At fifty-three she is visibly weary, and her marriage to Mario is in tatters. Watching her son in newlywed bliss—the hope, the trust, the joy—Bess knows it is time to face her own demons, and try to save her relationship. But she’ll have to throw off the burden of shame if she is to honour that sixteen-year-old girl whose dreams lie frozen in time.
Amanda’s ambition is to create stories that keep people from turning off the bedside lamp at night, that ensure you walk every step with her great characters, and tales that fill your head so you can’t possibly read another book until the memory fades…
Other novels by Amanda Prowse include A Mother’s Story, which won the coveted Sainsbury’s eBook of the Year Award. Perfect Daughter was selected as a World Book Night title in 2016. She has been described by the Daily Mail as ‘the queen of family drama’.
Can Bess face her past, finally come clean to Mario, and claim the love she has longed to fully experience all these years?
From the bestselling author of The Girl in the Corner comes a story that asks: what would you risk for a shot at happiness?
From the back of the book
Amanda Prowse has a real knack of creating characters that you really care for. In Bessie, she has written about a girl and a woman who many women will identify with. In 1984, teenage Bessie feels that her life has come to an end when she does really badly in her O levels and her best friend admits to an attraction to the boy Bessie is secretly having a relationship with. Fast forward to 2021 and Bessie is in a disappointing marriage and with her children having left home, she feels that life has passed her by.
Amanda is the most prolific writer of bestselling contemporary fiction in the UK today. Her titles consistently score the highest online review approval ratings across several genres.
About the Author
Waiting to Begin is another emotionally engaging book from Amanda Prowse who really does write about everyday people and situations so well. It is sure to be enjoyed by her many fans, who will take Bessie to their hearts.
Amanda Prowse is an international bestselling author of twenty-seven novels published in dozens of languages. Her chart-topping titles What Have I Done?, Perfect Daughter, My Husband’s Wife, The Coordinates of Loss, The Girl in the Corner and The Things I Know have sold millions of copies around the world.
My heart went out to young Bessie who felt everything had gone so wrong and it broke a bit for the older Bessie who was tortured by a secret from years gone by.
I received a copy of this book for review from ED Public Relations. Waiting to Begin is published by
Lake Union and is available now in all formats. The ebook version is currently just £1.
Being a similar age to Bessie I really felt for her in many ways, although I still have my children at home and luckily am in a very happy marriage. I particularly enjoyed all the 1980s cultural references which were like I was reading about my own teenage years.
There was a large cast of characters who all added to the story. Bessie’s friendship with Michelle, her best friend, was very realistically portrayed. It really reminded of my own teenage friendships and spending ages talking and sharing everything. Bessie’s lovely supportive mum and dad loved her unconditionally and her big brother Philip was also supportive in his own way. Her grown up children were interesting to read about too and I was particularly fond of Jake and his husband Dan and the joy they brought to the family.
1984. Bessie is a confident sixteen-year-old girl with the world at her feet, dreaming of what life will bring and what she’ll bring to this life. Then everything comes crashing down. Her bright and trusting smile is lost, banished by shame—and a secret she’ll carry with her for the rest of her life.
