Originally published: 14 June 2018

Author: Maggie Alderson

Published by: HarperCollins

Set in: London, UK

Genre: Chick-lit

Page count: 512

Reading dates: 6-9 June 2018

Star Rating: 4/5

Polly is a married perfume blogger and yoga teacher with two grown up children away at University. The book starts just after her husband David has announced he needs some time away from the family and has left on a research trip with the University, leaving no way of contacting him. She is understandably lost and confused but soon starts to make a life for herself. She bonds with the girls who do her yoga class; while visiting her glamorous mother in her retirement village she meets at old flame from University Edward and as her work as a perfume blogger, she meets a talented and mysterious perfumer, Guy.

Eventually she finds out the reason for her husband’s disappearance and strange behaviour but having adapted to life without him, she has to decide what she is going to do. As the tagline says, “Are you still married if you haven’t seen your husband for months?”

I have to admit, I’d already decided I’d find this one a bit of a chore. I haven’t read chick lit for quite a while and it is pretty long (500 pages). But I’m pleased to be proven wrong – I flew through this in just a couple of days. I liked that it was about a woman of a similar age to me (40s) with a family and that as well as telling the story we were treated to her blog posts about perfume and the scents that are connected to certain people or occasions. There is romance and glamour (lots of posh perfume events) and it was very readable. I hadn’t come across Maggie Alderson before and I’ll be keeping an eye out for her earlier novels.

In the spirit of the book which talks a lot about scent I thought I’d compile a list of scents I like!

– The Sea
– Coffee
– Old Books
– My kids’ heads (is this weird? Possibly!)
– Lilly’s
– Freshly mown grass

Some interesting tips I learnt about perfume in this book:

– Don’t save a perfume for best. If you love it, you should wear it whenever you fancy
– Don’t rub your wrists together after spraying perfume on them. It can bruise the fragrance.
– Don’t buy a perfume based on the first sniff…you have to see how to develops over time

If you want to read more about perfume, the character of this book has her own blog and you can read it here.  I’d love to hear what you favourite smells are (the weirder the better) and if you have a favourite perfume!

Thank you, HarperCollins, for sending me a copy of this to read.

About the author:

Maggie Alderson is a British-Australian author, born in London, brought up in rural Staffordshire, and educated at the University of St Andrews – and then at the University of Life, Sydney campus.
She spent many years covering the fashion shows in Paris, Milan, London and has edited five magazines (including British ELLE)
The Scent of You was inspired by attending perfume events in London and realising just how many fascinating people there are in that world (and a fair few brilliant nutters).