On Sale June 6, 2023

Park Row Books

When a relationship expert’s own marriage falls apart, she invites four strangers to Italy for a vacation of healing and second chances in this uplifting new novel from the author of The Messy Lives of Book People.

Ginny Splinter, acclaimed radio host and advice expert, prides herself on knowing what’s best for others. So she’s sure her husband, Adrian, will love the special trip to Italy she’s planned for their twenty-fifth wedding anniversary. But when Ginny presents the gift to Adrian, he surprises her with his own very different plan—a divorce.

Beside herself with heartache, Ginny impulsively invites four heartbroken listeners to join her in Italy instead while live on air. From hiking the hills of Bologna to riding a gondola in Venice to sharing stories around the dining table of the little Italian hotel, Ginny and her newfound company embark on a vacation of healing.

However, when Adrian starts to rethink their relationship, Ginny must decide whether to commit to her marriage or start afresh, alone. And an unexpected stranger may hold the key to a very different future… Sunny, tender and brimming with charm, The Little Italian Hotel explores marriage, identity and reclaiming the present moment—even if it means leaving the past behind.

Excerpt

Mountains

“Hi, it’s Ginny Splinter, I’m listening. Tell me your worries…”

It was something she said so many times a day on her Just Ask Ginny radio show it had become second nature, like sprinkling sunflower seeds on her muesli or kissing her husband, Adrian, on the cheek before he left for work each morning.

Ginny arrived early at the Talk Heart FM studio that day to pass a financial planning article to a security guard who’d confided to her he was struggling to pay his rent. She stopped to chat to the young receptionist whose boyfriend wouldn’t commit to anything more serious between them.

“You shouldn’t rely on him for your own self-esteem. Never forget you’re a prize worth winning,” Ginny told her with a kind smile. “Come talk to me anytime.”

The receptionist wiped a tear from her eye. “Do you really mean that?”

“A promise is a promise. Stay strong, sweetheart.”

Ginny walked away with a glow in her chest, touched when others trusted her with their personal issues. She wasn’t one to toot her own horn, but when her friends wept into their chardonnay, she was the one they turned to for good advice and packets of tissues. Where others saw paths littered with broken glass, she chose to picture the sun rising over the mountains. It was probably why thousands of folk from Greenham, Ginny’s leafy northwest England hometown, tuned in to her daily advice show.

Throughout her fifteen years on the air, there wasn’t a problem Ginny hadn’t tried to fix, whether it was loneliness, retirement worries, body dysmorphia, noisy neighbors or bullying at work. She offered solutions for the lost loves, secret loves and the never-been-in-loves. Empathy was her superpower.

Other people’s issues made her appreciate her happy marriage all the more. Her twenty-fifth wedding anniversary was just around the corner and she couldn’t wait to celebrate it in style. Whenever Ginny thought about the surprise holiday she’d booked for her and Adrian, in Italy, she couldn’t help smiling. Next month, in June, they were going to be staying in a gorgeous little village, Vigornuovo in Bologna, for three whole weeks. It would also be the perfect opportunity to renew their wedding vows, to reaffirm their love and commitment to each other and to have some fun, too.

The thought of spending quality time alone with her husband made a rush of warmth flood her skin. Ginny couldn’t wait to wander the side streets of Venice at dusk and admire Botticelli’s The Birth of Venus in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence. More than anything, she wanted to reignite the spark in her marriage. She and Adrian had been so busy recently that they were like cars speeding along a motorway in opposite directions. It made her feel uncharacteristically listless, especially now that their daughter, twenty-four-year-old Phoebe, had left home to move in with her fiancé, Pete, and was busy arranging her own wedding.

Ginny usually advised fellow empty nesters to keep busy by taking up a new hobby, perhaps home baking or walking a neighbor’s dog, but she was struggling to practice what she preached. Her hormones had felt out of balance for some time and sticking HRT patches to her backside, to banish her hot flashes, hadn’t proved to be the wonder cure she’d hoped for.

Last week, she’d had a worrying urge to rip open her blouse on the high street and flash her lacy bra to passersby. “See, I’m here, still desirable, not invisible!” she’d wanted to shout. But really, she wanted her husband to make her feel that way. The Italian holiday was going to be the perfect solution.

When she stepped into the elevator at work, Ginny was faced with a new life-sized poster of herself. She had an auburn high ponytail with a trademark curl at the end, and was wearing a pastel blue skirt suit with animal print heels. Her face had been airbrushed, removing every wrinkle, and she’d been given a golden halo and wings.

Ginny Splinter, Advice Angel, said the tagline.

Ginny pursed her lips. She didn’t like that her lines had been erased. She’d earned them over forty-nine years of life experience, like gathering stamps in a passport.

In the office, she waved at her latest producer, Tam. There was a conveyor belt of young graduates keen to join Talk Heart FM, using it as a training ground before migrating to bigger and better roles elsewhere. Tam was the latest recruit. She buzzed with ideas and her oversized black-rimmed glasses screamed ambition.

Tam propelled her chair across the office at great speed while sitting in it. “Gin, babe,” she said, tapping a pen against her teeth. “Thought we’d shake things up today and take some live calls, if you’re up for it?”

Ginny sat down at her desk and frowned. “Are you sure that’s sensible? We’ve got time to run through the show and handpick a few problems. It gives me time to digest them and give my best advice.”

Her mind flicked back to a live call during which a woman had set fire to her husband’s clothes after discovering his affair. Fortunately, he’d not been wearing them at the time. Afterward, Ginny had fielded lots of calls from concerned listeners and had to assure them everything was okay. Since then, all her producers preferred to pre-record conversations.

Tam drummed her fingers on the table. “Come on, Gin. Today’s lead news story is about a herd of sheep escaping into Greenham town center.” She fanned a yawn with her hand. “You must be bored of the same old format, too. We don’t want Just Ask Ginny to become the missionary position of advice shows.”

Ginny narrowed her eyes. She knew her audience well. “Playing some great music, reading out listeners’ letters and giving them advice on air, plus a few pre-recorded interviews is a proven formula,” she said. “And the new poster makes me look like someone off Love Island.”

Tam slow-blinked and tapped her teeth again. “Hmm…” she said, looking Ginny up and down critically. “Not sure about that.”

Ginny was increasingly aware she was now twice the age of her colleagues. It felt unbelievable, laughable even, that she and Adrian would both turn fifty later that year. She always told callers that age was just a number, but she was finding the milestone confusing. One minute, she treated herself to a new pair of sparkly stilettoes, and the next she found herself reading reviews for thermal nightdresses. She bought pretty lingerie and vitamins to improve her energy levels. She was far from being old, but her youth sometimes seemed like a distant memory.

“I’ve made my decision.” Tam pointed her pen at Ginny’s chest like a pistol. “Let’s go for the live calls.”

Ginny tried not to growl.

A few minutes later, she went live on air, playing songs by Ed Sheeran, Adele and Coldplay, slotting in a couple of her own choices by Red Hot Chili Peppers and The Strokes.

Many of the callers seeking advice used a pseudonym and sometimes even affected a fake voice. Ginny nervously gnawed the inside of her cheek as she took a live call from Confused of Greenham. The woman didn’t know whether to enter a third marriage with a kind, generous man she didn’t love, or to pursue a fling with a younger pizza delivery guy.

“Picture yourself five years from now,” Ginny said. “You’re lying on your sofa, wrapped in a blanket with a dose of the flu. A hand gently sweeps the hair off your clammy forehead. You open your eyes and see someone holding out a cup of hot tea and some aspirin for you. Is it your fiancé or the pizza guy?”

“My fiancé, I suppose,” Confused said.

“Then there’s your answer. You can get pizza anytime from any place. Care and understanding are more difficult to come by.”

Ginny wrapped up the call and Tam’s weary voice came through her headphones. “Try making the next call sexier, Gin,” she said. “We don’t want listeners nodding off.”

“I’m here to help, not titillate,” Ginny said through gritted teeth. She ran a hand down her ponytail and picked up a call from the next person on the line. “Hello, it’s Ginny Splinter, I’m listening. Tell me your worries.”

The woman’s voice sounded shaky. “Oh, hello. It’s Miss…Peach.”

“Well, hi there, Miss Peach. Thanks for joining me today,” Ginny said. “Is there anything you’d like to share?”

The caller’s words stuttered out. “I only stayed with my husband for the sake of our child. You make a promise and then you’re stuck with it, for life. I wish I’d got out while I had the chance… I’ve wasted so much precious time and now I don’t know what to do.”

A familiar ache of compassion rose in Ginny’s chest. It was something she welcomed but had also learned to control, so other people’s problems didn’t affect her too deeply. “I’m sorry to hear that,” she soothed. “It sounds like you’ve been through a tough time. There’s nothing you can do to change the past, but you can take control of your future.”

“What if it’s too late for that?”

“It’s never too late to move on. Focus on yourself and consider what you really want from life—”

“And what if I don’t know?” Miss Peach snapped. “What if I’ve forgotten how to think about me?”

Ginny hmm’d and delivered a sympathetic pause while considering what advice to give her caller. People often just needed a gentle push in the right direction. “Why not make a list of all the things you enjoy, perhaps a walk in the country or a trip to the cinema. Try to get to know yourself again and—”

“As if that will work,” Miss Peach interrupted, her tone growing more brittle. “And what do you know anyway? You think you’re little Ms. Perfect, don’t you?”

Ginny’s scalp prickled and her mouth dried. Her uneasy sensation made the room tilt a little. She waved a hand, trying to get Tam’s attention through the glass partition, but the producer was busy scrolling on her phone. “This call is about you, not me,” she told Miss Peach. “Please don’t let your regrets eat you up.”

“I’ve seen photos of you and your husband in a magazine. Adrian, isn’t it? You think you have such a marvelous life together.”

Ginny’s heartbeat began to thump ominously in her ears. A few thousand people would be listening in to this conversation. Oh, god, she hoped Adrian or Phoebe weren’t tuning in. Organizing a wedding was stressful enough for her daughter without this. Ginny drew a finger across her neck, indicating to Tam she was thinking of cutting the caller off.

Her producer didn’t notice.

“Shouldn’t you address your own problems before you lecture other people?” Miss Peach continued. “Do you even know what your husband gets up to at work? How well do you really know him?”

Ginny hesitated and rubbed the double lines between her eyebrows. Of course she knew Adrian, from the way the moles on his back formed a diamond shape, to how he liked his toast served warm, not hot, and with butter spread right to the edges. He didn’t like the bedroom to be stuffy so he slept with the window ajar, even if it meant Ginny had to wear socks in bed during winter. He thought Porsches were works of art but would feel like a cliché owning one. He could be grumpy until his morning coffee kicked in and he enjoyed a nice glass of Rioja most evenings. He loved dogs, hated cats, liked dark chocolate but never white and sang Oasis songs while he shaved.

Nevertheless, something icy seemed to slither down her spine. “Miss Peach, what do you mean by—?” Ginny started.

“Ask him,” Miss Peach said.

“Ask him what?”

But there was a click and the line went dead.

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About the Author

Phaedra Patrick is the bestselling author of several novels, including The Curious Charms of Arthur Pepper, which has been translated into twenty-five languages worldwide. Her second novel, Rise and Shine Benedict Stone, was made into a Hallmark movie. An award-winning short story writer, she previously studied art and marketing and has worked as a stained glass artist, film festival organizer and communications manager. Phaedra lives in Saddleworth, UK, with her family.

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