#BlogTour | The Mum Who Got Her Life Back by @FionaGibson | Extract | @AvonBooksUK

An empty nest has never been so much fun!

I have a treat for you all on this Monday morning with an extract from The Mum Who Got Her Life Back by Fiona Gibson, as ‘the laugh-out-loud Sunday Times bestseller is back and funnier than ever!’ 

Described as a ‘brilliantly funny novel for mums everywhere’, it will be published on the 7th March with Avon Books and I am delighted to be part of the blog tour today.

I’ve just started reading it myself and felt an immediate warmth off the pages. I expect it will be very easy to like the characters in this book!!

Here are the details and of course the extract, which I hope you enjoy, as well as the information for the other tour stops.

[ About the Book ]

When her 18-year-old twins leave for university, single mum Nadia’s life changes in ways she never expected: her Glasgow flat feels suddenly huge, laundry doesn’t take up half her week, and she no longer has to buy ‘the Big Milk’. After almost two decades of putting everyone else first, Nadia is finally taking care of herself. And with a budding romance with new boyfriend Jack, She’s never felt more alive.

That is, until her son Alfie drops out of university, and Nadia finds her empty nest is empty no more. With a heartbroken teenager to contend with, Nadia has to ask herself: is it ever possible for a mother to get her own life back? And can Jack and Nadia’s relationship survive having a sulky teenager around?

[ Extract ]

Since my children left home, nothing terrible seems to have happened. There has been no evidence of malnutri­tion or the taking of shedloads of drugs. No one has phoned me, crying, because they couldn’t get a crumpet out of the toaster. At eighteen years old, my twins Alfie and Molly seem to have coped perfectly well during their first semester at university . . . which means I’ve done a decent job as a parent, right?

Naturally, their father, Danny, should take some of the credit. But the moving-out part was down to me. Danny is an independent film-maker and he was away shooting down south when I took Molly to her student halls. In the seven years since we split, his career has blossomed; he is pretty famous in film circles, and incredibly busy. At least, too busy/famous to drive Molly from our home in Glasgow to her university halls in Edinburgh.

‘Well, this is it,’ I remarked with fake jollity as we lugged her possessions into her stark little room.

‘Yeah,’ she said casually, tossing back her long dark hair.

‘You will be all right, won’t you?’

‘Course I will!’

I cleared my throat. ‘Any time you need me, I mean if you need anything, I’ll come straight over.’

‘Mum, I won’t need—’

‘No, I know, but . . .’ I stopped. My daughter has always given the impression that she rarely needs anything, from anyone.

‘I’m not dying,’ she said, smiling. We hugged tightly, and I was immensely proud of myself as I hurtled out of the block, shoving my way past more new arrivals with their stoical parents and desk lamps and mini fridges and, in one instance, a gerbil in a cage, which I was pretty sure wasn’t allowed in halls. Only when I was safely back in my car did I allow the tears to spill out, and had to mop my face on a waterproof umbrella sleeve.

[ Bio ]

As a self-confessed magazine addict, Fiona started working on teen bible Jackie in Dundee at the age of 17. Originally from a West Yorkshire village called Goose Eye, she spent her twenties as a magazine journalist in London and moved to a crumbling old house in the South Lanarkshire countryside when her twin sons were toddlers.

When her boys left for university, Fiona felt a craving for city life again. With her husband Jimmy and their daughter Erin, she now lives in a flat in Glasgow. She loves to draw, paint, cook and run – usually with her collie cross, Jack (just the running part).

Twitter – @FionaGibson
Website – http://www.fionagibson.com/