I put A Week In Winter on my list after it was published posthumously and picked it up at the library at the beginning of the summer. I'd been reading some pretty heavy stuff that was taking me FOREVER to get through, and wanted something fun and light for a change of pace. The title suggests that you curl up in a chair under a quilt with snow falling outside your window and read with a cup of coffee in one hand, but it was a pretty good summer read too!
The book is a collection of stories about the people who congregate for a week-long vacation at Stone House in Ireland, run by Chicky Starr. Chicky ran off with an American, and returned to Ireland to open this Inn/B&B after their relationship ended. Chicky, Rigger, a young man with a past who proves to be a useful handyman and really right-hand-man, and Chicky's niece Orla, welcome a colorful bunch of people for their first week in business.
Binchy then gives each person or couple their own story as to how they arrived at Stone House, and then how the stay changed their lives, or didn't, for that matter. Each character has his or her own story of how they ended up in what seems like a Godforsaken place - the coast of Ireland in the dead of winter.
I love this kind of story - the background of characters and how they come to be somewhere or bond as a group. It was never boring, because it was like a bunch of short stories. Family relationships, love interests, in-laws, work relationships - this book has it all!
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