Sarah Rayner
"Reading a Sarah Rayner book is like having a no-holds-barred chat with a close friend..."
Sarah Rayner writes both fiction and non-fiction and has sold over 750,000 books worldwide. She is the author of six novels - including 'Searching for Mr. Yesterday', published in February 2023. Her novel, the international bestseller, 'One Moment, One Morning' has two follow-ups, 'The Two Week Wait' and 'Another Night, Another Day', which feature the same Brighton-based characters.
She is also the author/publisher of the 'Making Friends' series of non-fiction self-help books. 'Making Friends with Anxiety: a warm, supportive little book to help ease worry and panic', 'Making Friends with the Menopause' and 'Making Peace with Depression' were published in 2022 by Thread, the non-fiction imprint of Bookouture. They were fully revised and edited for republication.
In 2021, Sarah published 'No More Tigers', her mother's childhood memoir, through her independent imprint, Creative Pumpkin Publishing. Mary Rayner grew up in Burma and when she was eight years old, in 1942, Mary and her family fled from Burma to India on foot to escape the invading Japanese. Mary Rayner is now 89, and is the author/illustrator of the 'Pig Books'. Sarah has written both a Foreword and Afterword for the memoir which is available on Amazon.
To find out more about Sarah or get in touch, please visit her website, www.sarah-rayner.com - it always makes her day to hear to hear from her readers. She is also on Facebook, Instagram and TicToc (search for Creative Pumpkin) and regularly posts about her life in Brighton, England, where she lives with her husband, Tom.
“She has no regrets; she knows now he could never have made her happy, even though he has, apparently, joined AA, is doing better. But sobriety is his journey, not hers; he needs to do it for himself, alone. Still, she misses him hugely, doesn't feel ready for another relationship yet. But as time passes, she hopes that she might be, eventually, with someone new, easier, kinder.”
“Anna has a stab of jealousy - she is thrilled for them, yet can't help but envy their happiness. Don't be ungracious, she tells herself. It is not your time; it is theirs. Lou is so lovely; she deserves to be happy.”
“While Karen loved Simon for all his faults, Anna doesn't love Steve for his. She can't and never will. How can she, when Steve's worst fault leads to this?”
“When merely meeting someone is ridden with angst and open to misinterpretation, is it any wonder she is so hopeless at relationships.”
“Her stomach lurches. She fancies him sooo much - she is powerless to resist. How can she possibly? She knows it's wrong: he has a girlfriend - he lives with her, for goodness' sake - and what they're doing is unfair, cruel. She is not sure what he's said to his girlfriend to wangle a night away and she doesn't want to know. She would hate it if it was done to her - she has never seen herself as the kind of girl who would steal another woman's man. She and Anna have always been most disapproving about women who do that, arguing through college and beyond that there are plenty of available men out there, that it is quite unnecessary to go for those already spoken for. But she has liked Simon since day one, and he is the one who initiated this whole thing. He is the one who blew her away with a clandestine kiss just a week ago, who asked if he could come back and stay at hers afterwards; he is the one who doubtless made unconvincing excuses when he returned home the next day. And it only took that single night to open this Pandora's box of mutual passion, being together was far, far better than it should have been, were it only a one-night stand. Karen senses that he really likes her.”
“She watches Simon's profile as he drives, concentrating, but he keeps turning to her, and every time he does so, he is smiling. He doesn't seem to care, and she wonders if, actually, he wants to be caught. In some ways she does, because she knows, already, albeit crazily swiftly, that she wants more of this man, that once was never, ever going to be enough.”
“She has had a couple of lovers before, but honest to God, no one has ever felt as good, as perfect a fit, as him.”
“Give her a weak man and she'll inadvertently run rings around him. He simply wasn't strong enough for her.”
“That's the tragedy of falling in love; it brings with it the potential for loss.”
“I couldn't imagine it, living a pristine life in this big Georgian house and everything. It seemed heinous. So I left him. I thought I'd go mad, if I stayed.”
“Anna seems warmer every time I meet her, thinks Lou. Funny, that. Some people, who seem friendly on first impression, turn out to be disappointingly superficial, whereas the aloof ones, like Anna, emerge as affectionate and loyal.”
“What Karen wants to do - needs to do - is cry, but she can't. Here, alone, when she could howl, beat the sofa cushions, scream; now, somehow, she is unable. It's for fear that if she gives in to it, she'll lose all sense of who she is. She is afraid that if she falls apart in private, then she'll fall apart completely. That if she crumbles, like a house in an earthquake, she will disappear down some deep, dark crevasse, and never be able to pull herself out and put herself back together again.”
“Wrestling through her introspection has coloured her views of life, people and relationships. And working it out, with all the excitement, pain and fear that went with it, has given her a strong sense of herself. She knows who she is because of it. Not only that: it has given her a strong bond to those who are also, in different ways and for different reasons, disconnected from society. ironically, she is connected to the Aaron's and Kyra's of this world by the fact that they are each of them disconnected.”