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Moving On
Four women.
All very different from one another.
But with one tragic bond between them - they are all widows.
Sarah is the organiser of the group. After losing her husband Jonny she’s finally getting used to life on her own. Can she find happiness again with Tony?
Kate is struggling to raise two children on her own and misses the physical intimacy of her marriage to Charlie. Will she find love through online dating? Or will she learn she doesn’t need a man to make her happy?
Ailsa is determined to get her life going again after losing Tom and signs up for philosophy school and yoga classes. Will she find peace? And maybe even love at her lessons?
Victoria is alone and childless, and needs the support of her fellow widows more than any of them. Will Victoria decide to stay in Cape Town and make a go of things? Or will she return to her family in England?
'Moving On' follows the highs and lows of a group of widows as they struggle to re-build their lives. It is a story of friendship, love, loss and hope. A story of new beginnings and second chances.
'An emotional roller-coaster of a read.' - Holly Kinsella, best-selling author of 'Uptown Girl'.
Joanna Ross is a journalist, traveller, writer, actress, mother and widow, currently living in Cape Town. 'Moving On' is her first novel. Endeaavour Press is the UK's leading independent publisher of digital books.
All very different from one another.
But with one tragic bond between them - they are all widows.
Sarah is the organiser of the group. After losing her husband Jonny she’s finally getting used to life on her own. Can she find happiness again with Tony?
Kate is struggling to raise two children on her own and misses the physical intimacy of her marriage to Charlie. Will she find love through online dating? Or will she learn she doesn’t need a man to make her happy?
Ailsa is determined to get her life going again after losing Tom and signs up for philosophy school and yoga classes. Will she find peace? And maybe even love at her lessons?
Victoria is alone and childless, and needs the support of her fellow widows more than any of them. Will Victoria decide to stay in Cape Town and make a go of things? Or will she return to her family in England?
'Moving On' follows the highs and lows of a group of widows as they struggle to re-build their lives. It is a story of friendship, love, loss and hope. A story of new beginnings and second chances.
'An emotional roller-coaster of a read.' - Holly Kinsella, best-selling author of 'Uptown Girl'.
Joanna Ross is a journalist, traveller, writer, actress, mother and widow, currently living in Cape Town. 'Moving On' is her first novel. Endeaavour Press is the UK's leading independent publisher of digital books.
- GenresRomanceContemporary
235 pages, Kindle Edition
First published October 1, 2013
30 people are currently reading
104 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
January 6, 2016
I have never read a novel by Joanna Ross prior to "Moving On" but was very pleased with what I have read and hope the next book she publishes is just as good as this one.
Ms. Ross's novel takes place in Cape Town, South Africa (not a country I am familiar with at all) and revolves around four women who were widowed who have formed a 'Widow's Club'.
We have Sarah, Kate, Ailsa, and Victoria.
Sarah lost her husband four years ago has been raising her three boys by herself. She has started to finally start thinking romantically about her friend Tony who is also dealing with raising three children on his own.
Kate lost her husband Charlie almost two years ago and is exhausted from trying to manage her two young children by herself.
Ailsa has held on to being resentful of her now deceased husband for decades due to him getting her pregnant while they were at university. His unexpected illness and then death has left her feeling adrift.
Victoria is an ex-pat from England who is newly arrived in South Africa. Reeling from the unexpected death of her husband and their lack of children has caused her to question everything in her life up until now.
As I said I have never read a novel that has taken place in South Africa. I was very intrigued about the location and the way that Ms. Ross writes it, Cape Town could be any city in Europe. Except for a few instances where the author mentions apartheid, Nelson Mandela, and electric fencing in affluent neighborhoods. I have to admit I never thought of Cape Town being particular affluent but Ms. Ross paints a world that is really not that far removed from most western countries. I do want to say that I wish that we had gotten a bit more detail on Africa in general. Ms. Ross does a very good job of describing locations, weather, and terrain of Africa.
I really did like all of the women in this story and thought that an idea of a widow's club was a good one. I felt as if each woman was very distinct and voice and mannerisms were not the same so I didn't get confused or need to recall details on any of them. I have to say that the woman I was most interested in reading about was Sarah. My least favorite was Kate. I felt like she whined and was jealous of everyone else too much for me to give her a lot of sympathy.
There are two main reasons why I only gave this novel four stars. First, there was some formatting issues in my Kindle version. Not enough to completely derail my reading but noticeable enough that there were just sometimes random paragraph breaks that would appear.
The second issue is that sometimes in a few places the flow of the novel would get hampered. Once again, not a lot, but just a few times here and there.
All in all I really did enjoy this novel and would love to read a sequel to catch up with all of the women. Especially since there were some very interesting developments that occurred towards the end of the novel.
Ms. Ross's novel takes place in Cape Town, South Africa (not a country I am familiar with at all) and revolves around four women who were widowed who have formed a 'Widow's Club'.
We have Sarah, Kate, Ailsa, and Victoria.
Sarah lost her husband four years ago has been raising her three boys by herself. She has started to finally start thinking romantically about her friend Tony who is also dealing with raising three children on his own.
Kate lost her husband Charlie almost two years ago and is exhausted from trying to manage her two young children by herself.
Ailsa has held on to being resentful of her now deceased husband for decades due to him getting her pregnant while they were at university. His unexpected illness and then death has left her feeling adrift.
Victoria is an ex-pat from England who is newly arrived in South Africa. Reeling from the unexpected death of her husband and their lack of children has caused her to question everything in her life up until now.
As I said I have never read a novel that has taken place in South Africa. I was very intrigued about the location and the way that Ms. Ross writes it, Cape Town could be any city in Europe. Except for a few instances where the author mentions apartheid, Nelson Mandela, and electric fencing in affluent neighborhoods. I have to admit I never thought of Cape Town being particular affluent but Ms. Ross paints a world that is really not that far removed from most western countries. I do want to say that I wish that we had gotten a bit more detail on Africa in general. Ms. Ross does a very good job of describing locations, weather, and terrain of Africa.
I really did like all of the women in this story and thought that an idea of a widow's club was a good one. I felt as if each woman was very distinct and voice and mannerisms were not the same so I didn't get confused or need to recall details on any of them. I have to say that the woman I was most interested in reading about was Sarah. My least favorite was Kate. I felt like she whined and was jealous of everyone else too much for me to give her a lot of sympathy.
There are two main reasons why I only gave this novel four stars. First, there was some formatting issues in my Kindle version. Not enough to completely derail my reading but noticeable enough that there were just sometimes random paragraph breaks that would appear.
The second issue is that sometimes in a few places the flow of the novel would get hampered. Once again, not a lot, but just a few times here and there.
All in all I really did enjoy this novel and would love to read a sequel to catch up with all of the women. Especially since there were some very interesting developments that occurred towards the end of the novel.
November 20, 2013
A unfortunately only mediocre story :( Both the storyline and characters lacks in deep and is a bit superficial. I give this story 2,5 stars.
October 13, 2018
Sarah, Ailsa, Kate and Victoria have one thing in common: They each lost their husbands before they turned forty. As they each attempt to move on in different ways, their regular meetings of the Widows' Club are a source of strength and support - and an excellent opportunity to get all that troubles or annoys them off their chests while indulging in copious amounts of wine.
I liked the concept and was hoping for something touching, bittersweet yet humorous, but it all felt a little too superficial to me. A lot of that was likely due to the writing style being all telling, no showing, and the characters not being all that deeply developed. I just didn't really care about any of them.
I liked the concept and was hoping for something touching, bittersweet yet humorous, but it all felt a little too superficial to me. A lot of that was likely due to the writing style being all telling, no showing, and the characters not being all that deeply developed. I just didn't really care about any of them.
April 29, 2019
Great bookl
I thought it was a great book. It was a realistic picture of widowhood and learning to be single. I look forward to more books by the author.
I thought it was a great book. It was a realistic picture of widowhood and learning to be single. I look forward to more books by the author.
April 3, 2014
Moving on by Joanna Ross is a delightful book. The subject, widowhood, isn't particularly delightful but how they deal with it is.
Sarah, Alisa, and Kate have formed the Widow's Club. They get together at Harvey's and discuss whatever is going on in their lives. They have helped each other through the grief of losing their husbands. Kate has two small children who were left behind when her husband suddenly died. Alisa has two teenage children who were left behind after her husband's long drawn out illness and death. Sarah has been widowed the longest and has two children. They all have faced the worst time of their life with the other two. Now a fourth person will be added to their club- Victoria.
Victoria is a well to do society lady whose husband just died while on a business trip. He had a heart attack. They were on the were of IVF to conceive a child. Now that idea is lost. Can Victoria fit into the club or is she too upper class for that.
Will these four ever find happiness with another man?
Sarah, Alisa, and Kate have formed the Widow's Club. They get together at Harvey's and discuss whatever is going on in their lives. They have helped each other through the grief of losing their husbands. Kate has two small children who were left behind when her husband suddenly died. Alisa has two teenage children who were left behind after her husband's long drawn out illness and death. Sarah has been widowed the longest and has two children. They all have faced the worst time of their life with the other two. Now a fourth person will be added to their club- Victoria.
Victoria is a well to do society lady whose husband just died while on a business trip. He had a heart attack. They were on the were of IVF to conceive a child. Now that idea is lost. Can Victoria fit into the club or is she too upper class for that.
Will these four ever find happiness with another man?
November 6, 2013
This book tells the story of four women who come together in support after being widowed young and how they try to rebuild their lives. At times very raw and painful at others rich with humour as they meet every month over what is known as 'widow's wine.
However it would have been good if it hadn't featured only well-off women but also some struggling in other ways.
However I was surprised that it seemed to be saying that moving on means finding a new sexual partner, is that really how the world thinks these days? The sex secenes were just not needed and added little if anything to the story!
On the whole though a pleasant little story
However it would have been good if it hadn't featured only well-off women but also some struggling in other ways.
However I was surprised that it seemed to be saying that moving on means finding a new sexual partner, is that really how the world thinks these days? The sex secenes were just not needed and added little if anything to the story!
On the whole though a pleasant little story
February 5, 2014
Only a few pages into it and the errors are distracting from the story. She's repeated that Ailsa has two teens twice, has a typo when mentioning Kate's 'twenty old' baby sitter. And at first Kate's almost four year old is a girl, then suddenly it's explained that she has two boys. This is literally in the first 2% of the book. Maybe I'm too nerdy - but it's frustrating to be distracted like this!
Finished this one on Feb 5th, couldn't finish it fast enough to be honest. It was far too repetitive and not edited well enough for me to give it more than two stars.
Finished this one on Feb 5th, couldn't finish it fast enough to be honest. It was far too repetitive and not edited well enough for me to give it more than two stars.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews