Plans for a small and simple ceremony get complicated in An Island Wedding (Avon), the fifth book in prolific bestselling wordsmith Jenny Colgan’s Mure Island series. Give yourself permission to relax and enjoy it as a standalone novel even if you missed the previous four! The author provides a reassuring introduction for established and new fans alike with a cheery, concise synopsis summarizing the previous storylines and roles of the main characters. She then proceeds to set the stage for the excitement that a long-anticipated wedding promises to bring to this lively village community.
SET ON AN ENCHANTED ISLAND
The fictional Mure Island evokes the essence of real-life Scotland highland islands such as Orkney and Shetland. This enchanted place is situated between northernmost coastal Scotland and Norway at roughly the confluence of the Atlantic Ocean and the North Sea. It’s included in the area known as the land of the midnight sun, where blackout curtains are needed in midsummer to block out the 24-hour daylight. The sea and sky are bright shades of azure and turquoise blue, and the hillsides are green wherever they are not already covered in heather, gorse and wildflowers.
Winter dazzles residents and visitors with the shimmering wonder of the aurora borealis. The pubs, shops, businesses and homes on Mure Island are painted in vivid hues to dispel the oyster light, gloom, fog and early darkness prevalent much of the year. You understandably might not wish to reside here year-round, but like Brigadoon, it’s a beautiful, memorable place to visit.
June may no longer be the most popular month for weddings (September currently has that distinction, June is second, followed by October, a scant percentage point behind). Mure Islanders, however, know Midsummer is the optimal date for them as it almost guarantees the bride and her attendants will not have to wear wellingtons under their gowns.
TWO CONFLICTING WEDDING PLANS
Flora McKenzie is the bride-to-be, planning her wedding to fiancé Joel, a transplanted American, who was formerly her employer in London. Mure is her home turf. Her widower father and three brothers operate the family farm. She returned to Scotland to run a café named the Seaside Kitchen, and has recently assumed the management of Rock Hotel, the finest inn in the village. Nine-month-old baby Douglas also consumes much of her time and energy.
Joel would like a no-fuss intimate sweetheart ceremony with the vicar with attendance limited to his nuclear family, or at most, her immediate family. He was a foster child, shifted between several caretakers, and lacks home ties or any understanding of the custom of including the entire community in a festive wedding celebration, usually complete with pipers, Highland dancers and a blow-out party. They select June 21, the summer solstice, for their special day.
Conflict and complications arise when Olivia Mathieson, the most famous former resident of Mure, decides to stage a wedding extravaganza for her own marriage to her super-rich fiancé at the Rock on the same day. Flora is loath to deny this booking as it would fill the boutique hotel and bring loads of free publicity.
Olivia is a supermodel, television spokesperson and noted Instagram influencer — an undisputed “great beauty” whose face has been lauded since babyhood. It has been her golden ticket to international fame (but little real fortune), and the extravagant platinum and diamond engagement ring she wears would have made the late Elizabeth Taylor drool. Olivia storms the beach, arriving at the harbor on the Caledonian MacBray ferry along with its daily newspaper and parcels, along with her abrasive personal assistant/wedding planner Jacinth who seems ready to offend one and all with her over-the-top ideas.
Olivia retains a sweetness and grace about her that wins over everyone but her immediate family. Her mother is proud of her accomplishments but her older sister, plain and capable Jan, is ever hypercritical and jealous of the attention paid to Olivia’s enchanting beauty. It didn’t help that her formative years were filled with unsolicited commentary about her lack of good looks.
A major subplot concerns a clandestine romance between Flora’s best friend, Lorna, the village schoolmistress, and the well-respected physician Dr. Saif, a Syrian refugee who made a harrowing escape from his war-torn country with his two young sons. He is torn between the love of his homeland and the opportunity to become a UK citizen.
A ROM-COM FIT FOR THE SCREEN
An Island Wedding is highly entertaining, a quick read with plenty of levity and light bantering between the islanders. There are some truly hilarious moments such as when Olivia’s entourage arrives and instantly declare themselves to be “Instagram influencers” and proceed to demand free goods and services from various pub and shopkeepers. They are laughed off with not-so-polite reminders that they are on a remote island in Northeast Scotland.
Colgan deftly addresses some of the issues facing refugees as well as environmental concerns about the protection of pods of whales that periodically approach close harbors. Her superb writing is fast-paced and sufficiently complex in subject matter and themes to be enjoyed by reading groups. An Island Wedding would even make a great film.
RELATED POSTS
Lisa Duffy on Creating a Memorable Island Community in “My Kind of People”
A New Beau for Divorced San Fran Islander
Bachelorette Fling Haunts Newlyweds’ Idyllic Honeymoon in “Every Vow You Break”
https://booktrib.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/Jenny-Colgan-Author-copy.jpg
About Jenny Colgan:
Jenny Colgan is the author of numerous bestselling novels for adults, including Meet Me at the Cupcake Café and Little Beach Street Bakery. When Neil the puffin from Little Beach Street Bakery caught her readers’ attention, Jenny knew she needed a story of his own — and so the idea for Polly and the Puffin was born. Jenny is married with three children and lives in Scotland.
