If you’re in the mood for a fun read with a dash of naughty, then I highly recommend Limp Dicks and Saggy Tits by British author Tracie Podger. I guess it could be categorized as “Romance” as it is somewhat predictable and has a happy ending but the journey is highly enjoyable. Lizzie is fifty years old and newly divorced. She married as a teenager to her first love and after more than a quarter-century of marriage, her husband came out as gay and left her for a drag queen. She’d spent the majority of her life supporting his business interests and for obvious reasons, they never had children, so being cast adrift in middle age presented many challenges.
Lizzie’s best friend from childhood, Joe, is a successful real estate agent in London. He lives a few doors down from Lizzie and has always been there to support and encourage her. One evening Joe, who is also gay, suggests they make a quick stop at a nightclub where he has a crush on the owner, Richie. At the club, Lizzie is introduced to Richie’s brother, Ronan, who suggests he might have a proposition that would appeal to her. Ronan buys, renovates and flips properties. Lizzie mistakes his business interest in her as romantic when he invites her to dinner to discuss “things”.
When Ronan stands Lizzie up on their first ‘date’, she is disillusioned and angry. As it turns out, his mother in Scotland had died and he made a quick departure for his family home to organize the funeral and start to bring order to her affairs. It turns out his bohemian mother had let their ancestral estate fall into serious financial and physical disrepair during her last few years and Ronan hopes Lizzie can help him return it to its former glory, perhaps as an event venue.
When Lizzie travels north to Scotland with Ronan and arrives at the estate, she is surprised at its potential and puts all kinds of ideas forward to Ronan. One day when she is walking through the estate’s woodland, she is confronted by an elderly group of naked naturalist artists (hence the title of the book) who commune with trees and the earth in a quiet corner of the estate, thanks to the earlier generosity of Ronan’s hippie mother.
Meanwhile, Lizzie is trying to build a new life for herself and envisions moving out of London to a rural community in Kent. As I was reading the book, I pictured television’s Agatha Raisin playing Lizzie. She’s an attractive, middle-aged woman who wants a complete change of scenery and sets her sights on rural life. Will that life be in Scotland or Kent? Lizzie is accident-prone and she’s also a genuinely kind and thoughtful person which often leaves her vulnerable. She has a weird relationship with Danny, her neighbour at her London flat who gets her to feed his dead cat when he goes away for a few days. She’s constantly stumbling into pratfalls.
Even though the ending is fairly predictable, the book was great fun to read. The first few dozen pages were a bit slow to get through but once Lizzie travels to Scotland, the plot takes off. Limp Dicks and Saggy Tits is jolly good fun. And who doesn’t love imagining life with a sexy Scotsman in a kilt?
If you are unable to locate Limp Dicks & Saggy Tits by Tracie Podger at your local bookstore or library, click here or on the image of the book to order from Amazon.
(Disclosure: I may receive a teeny, tiny commission. Thanks.)
