Synopsis
What if you had been living a lie for most of your life?
In the first flush of love, Jonty promised to buy Lydie a precious ruby necklace when his art career took off. But the ruby never materialised and Lydie is left heartbroken when Jonty ends the relationship, leaving her pregnant out of wedlock, much to the fury of her straight-laced parents.
Nearly thirty years later and Lydie still thinks of Jonty and the passion they shared, stuck as she is in a marriage she never wanted to a man she was never in love with and desperate for a way out …
And then Jonty comes back into the picture. But not without a set of tragic circumstances that shock Lydie to the core and change her life beyond anything she could have ever imagined.
Linda Mitchelmore
Linda has had over two hundred short stories published worldwide. She has also won many short story writing competitions – Woman’s Own, Woman & Home and Writespace to name but three. In 2004, Linda was awarded The Katie Fforde Bursary by the Romantic Novelists’ Association, and has a story in their 50th Anniversary Anthology. Linda also won Short Story Radio Romance Prize 2010. Having started her writing career doing a short story course with Writing Magazine, she has now come full circle and is a preliminary judge for their short story competitions. Linda lives in Devon and is married with two grown-up children.
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Red is for Rubies starts with a life changing upheaval. Lydies’s family moved to a new a town and it never really feel like home to her. Added to her distress is the fact her daughter Grace, returns home after a break up from her boyfriend Justin.
Together they try to forge a new life for themselves. Lydie resumes selling her home-made jewellery, Ralph opens his new art gallery and Grace gets a job at a local pottery. While the combination of those things seem mundane, they spark off the most heart wrenching of events.
Lydie is reunited with her soul mate Jonty when her family suffered tragedy. Lydie and Jonty’s unique relationship ended thirty years previously. A casualty caused by miscommunication, bad timing and family intervention. Although a lifetime had past since Jonty and Lydie had been separated- they always held a torch for each other .
Lydie and Jonty want to pick up the thread of their relationship but there are other considerations that require their tact. Red is for Rubies is a bitter-sweet story and every situation is handled with compassion and realism.
Linda Mitchelmore creates an emotionally fraught atmosphere that compels you to empathize with her characters. Characters that are so fleshed out you would think you were reading a family’s memoir rather than a work of fiction.
I loved the fact that Linda Mitchelmore approached the subject of soul mates realistically. So many other books gives the Disney version of love conquers all; and that is rarely the case. Red is for Rubies gives us the version that most often happens when the time isn’t always right.
Red is for rubies is a finely crafted family drama that will bring tears and warm your heart. As Lydie tries to rebuild her life, you are left with a renewed sense of hope and sends the message that everything happens exactly how it should and in its own time.