Jilly Cooper returns to horses in a fabulously entertaining romp through the world of jump racing.

Etta Bancroft – sweet, kind, still beautiful – adores racing and harbours a crush on one of its stars, the handsome high-handed owner-trainer Rupert Campbell-Black. When her bullying husband dies, Etta’s selfish, ambitious children drag her from her lovely Dorset house to live in a hideous modern bungalowin the Cotswold village of Willowwood.

Etta’s life is transformed when she finds a horribly mutilated filly wandering in the woods. She names her Mrs Wilkinson and nurses her back to health. The filly charms everyone in the village, and when tests reveal her to be a spectacularly well-bred racehorse a village syndicate is formed to put the filly into training.

Captivating vast crowds as she progresses from point-to-point to major races, she brings fame and fortune to the syndicate, until, at last, she is entered in the greatest jump race of them all. Can Mrs Wilkinson win the Grand National? And can Etta gain her heart’s desire?

————————————–

‘Hugely entertaining, touching and funny, yet again Cooper has a winner’ Daily Express
‘The narrative zips along, pierced with her characteristically brilliant ear for dialogue and empathy for human relationships of all kinds…You won’t be able to put it down once you get going’ Daily Mail
‘A classic romp through the world of horse racing. Guilty pleasures rarely come as delicious as this’ ELLE

Read more

Lysander Hawkley is a good man – but far, far too attractive to women.

Lysander Hawkley combined breathtaking good looks with the kindest of hearts. He couldn’t pass a stray dog, an ill-treated horse or a neglected wife without rushing to the rescue. And with neglected wives the rescue invariably led to ecstatic bonking, which didn’t please their erring husbands one bit.

Lysander’s mid-life crisis had begun at twenty-two. Reeling from the death of his beautiful mother, he was out of work, drinking too much and desperately in debt. The solution came from Ferdie, his fat, fast-operating friend: if Lysander was so good at making husbands jealous, why shouldn’t he get paid for it?

Let loose among the neglected wives of the ritzy county of Rutshire, Lysander causes absolute havoc. But it is only when he meets Rannaldini, Rutshire’s King Rat and a temperamental, fiendishly promiscuous international conductor, that the trouble really starts. The only unglamorous woman around Rannaldini is Kitty, his plump young wife who runs his life like clockwork. Soon Lysander is convinced that Kitty must be rescued from Rannaldini at all costs, even if it means enlisting the help of the old blue-eyed havoc maker: Rupert Campbell-Black.

———————————

‘Wicked, sexy, sparkling with wit’ Sunday Express
‘Irresistible… I devoured it in a day… she’s on cracking form’ Sunday Telegraph
‘Delicious … her bawdy humour shines through at all times … settle down and have a rollicking good time. Satisfaction guaranteed!’ Jackie Collins

Read more

In Jilly Cooper’s third Rutshire chronicle we meet Ricky France-Lynch, who is moody, macho, and magnificent. He had a large crumbling estate, a nine-goal polo handicap, and a beautiful wife who was fair game for anyone with a cheque book. He also had the adoration of fourteen-year-old Perdita MacLeod. Perdita couldn’t wait to leave her dreary school and become a polo player.The polo set were ritzy, wild, and gloriously promiscuous.Perdita thought she’d get along with them very well.

But before she had time to grow up, Ricky’s life exploded into tragedy, and Perdita turned into a brat who loved only her horses – and Ricky France-Lynch.

Ricky’s obsession to win back his wife, and Perdita’s to win both Ricky and a place as a top class polo player, take the reader on a wildly exciting journey – to the estancias of Argentina, to Palm Beach and Deauville, and on to the royal polo fields of England and the glamorous pitches of California where the most heroic battle of all is destined to be fought – a match that is about far more than just the winning of a huge silver cup…

——————————

‘Compulsively readable and funny…the irrepressible Jilly remains irresistible’ The Times
‘Polo is the best thing she’s ever done’ Daily Mail
‘A work of towering genius’ Evening Standard

Read more

A tale of two schools…

At Bagley Hall, a notoriously wild, but increasingly academic, independent, crammed with the children of the famous, trouble is afoot. The ambitious and fatally attractive headmaster, Hengist Brett-Taylor, hatches a plan to share the facilities of his school with Larkminster Comprehensive – known locally, as ‘Larks’.

His reasons for doing so are purely financial, but he is encouraged by the opportunities the scheme gives him for frequent meetings with Janna Curtis, the dynamic new head of Larks, who has been drafted in to save what is a fast-sinking school from closure. Janna is young, pretty, enthusiastic and vastly brave – and she will do anything to rescue her demoralised, run-down and cash-strapped school.

Neither parents nor staff of either school are too keen on this radical move, although some can see the possible financial advantages. For the students, however, it offers great opportunities to get up to even more mayhem than usual.

————————————

‘Simply enjoy the wicked pleasures Cooper does so well’ The Observer
‘A brilliantly refreshing read’ Polly Vernon
‘The perfect beach companion’ Daily Mail
‘I devoured it with as much joy as I would a bucket of pistachio ice cream’ Daily Mail

Read more