The Motherhood Walk of Fame
Carly Cooper, harassed mother and disillusioned writer, has often been tempted to head for the hills. She just never imagined they'd be the Hollywood ones…A hilarious romantic comedy for anyone who’s ever had their head in the clouds…Carly's living the dream. Almost. She has the kids, the husband, the lethargic sex life, and who cares if her novels aren't exactly bestsellers – pole-vaulting her ironing pile is excitement enough.Just when she's resigned to domestic mediocrity, a phone call from Hollywood changes everything. Carly is off to Tinseltown…As she arrives in LA, Carly knows life will be transformed…but she doesn't count on marital disaster, a career roller-coaster and an A-list movie star who wants to offer her more than just a friendly welcome.Carly Cooper is strutting along the Hollywood Walk of Fame but can she get to the end without falling flat on her face?
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SHARI LOW
The Motherhood Walk of Fame
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
AVON
A division of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd. 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF
First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 2007
Copyright © Shari Low 2007
Shari Low asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work Spiderman Words and Music by Stephen Lemberg © Kama Sutra Music Inc, USA EMI United Partnership Ltd, London WC2H 0QY (Publishing) and Alfred Publishing Co, USA (Print) Administered in Europe by Faber Music Ltd Reproduced by permission All rights reserved. Batman Theme Words by Neal Hefti © 1966 EMI Catalogue Partnership and EMI Miller Catalog Inc, USA EMI United Partnership Ltd, London WC2H 0QY (Publishing) and Alfred Publishing Co, USA (Print) Administered in Europe by Faber Music Ltd Reproduced by permission All rights reserved. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
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Source ISBN: 9781847560032
Ebook Edition © 2009 ISBN: 9780007334919 Version: 2018-06-18
With huge gratitude to the two fabulous women who
guided this book to print: Sheila Crowley at AP Watt and Maxine Hitchcock at Avon. Ladies, thank you– working with you has been an absolute joy.
To the rest of the wonderful team at Avon–
I love my new home!
And to the others who give their unfailing support:
Linda Shaughnessy, Rob Kraitt, Teresa Nicholls and the rest of the team at AP Watt. I’m counting my blessings…Sxx
To Betty Murphy–we’ll never stop missing you.
And to my big guy and two little ones…
Everything, always…
Now can one of you go put the tea on.
Table of Contents
I knew something was wrong. As I bit down on an apple Danish, one of my five daily fruit and vegetable portions as recommended by Government health guidelines, I had that vaguely edgy feeling of unease–the one I normally get when PMT is raging and I want to commit acts that’ll guarantee me a starring role on Crimewatch.
Actually, I never watch that programme. The minute the theme music starts I have to switch over, because a feeling of crushing guilt comes over me even though I know that I don’t own a balaclava and I was nowhere near the Kensington Post Office three weeks ago last Thursday at 10.24 a.m.
Still, I couldn’t put my finger on exactly what was bugging me. It was just another normal Monday morning. And up until that point, everything had been pretty much uneventful. My husband, Mark, had risen at some ungodly hour, staggered to the bathroom, peed with his eyes still shut, shaved with one eye open, returned to our bedroom and dressed in the dark. Due to this well-practised regime, all his business clothes were of the same colour to avoid ritual humiliation and ridicule.
He tripped over his briefcase at the bottom of the stairs, before picking himself back up, grabbing a banana from the fruit bowl and checking his reflection in the hall mirror. At that point, by some power of cosmic wonderment, his transformation was complete. Gone was the zombied, scruff-ball dosser who couldn’t even manage to pee in a stationary receptacle without leaving splash marks on the surrounding area; and in his place was Mark Barwick, corporate lawyer and all-round babe-magnet.
He then got into his flash sports car, flicked on the flash radio and set off on his mind-numbing commute from our Richmond semi to his flash office in a flash tower block in a flash area of London.
