Ten Books…based in Cafés

This post was originally published at Novelicious.com and is now at WritingTipsOasis.com. WritingTipsOasis.com acquired Novelicious.com in June 2022.

Finding a brilliant café is one of life's pleasures. Somewhere you can get a decent cup of coffee or a relaxing cup of tea and the choice of some delicious homemade cakes. Meet Me at the Cupcake Café by Jenny Colgan and The Beach Café by Lucy Diamond are just two café based books we've mentioned in recent months. Inspired to find more books based in cafés (or maybe a teashop) here is our ten.

1. The Irresistible Blueberry Bakeshop and Café by Mary Simses – Chosen on the strength of the book cover alone this is the story of Manhattan lawyer Ellen Branford who is going to Beacon, Maine to carry out her grandmother's last wish. She has to give a letter to the boy she first loved.

2. The Little Coffee Shop of Kabul by Deborah Rodriguez – A café in the heart of Afghanastan, five different women come together. One is the café owner trying to think of a way to keep her customers safe; a woman, pregnant, stolen from her remote village and now left on the dangerous streets; an American who has fallen for an Afghan; a journalist; and a den-mother. These five women, form a bond in the little coffee shop of the title. 

3. Cupcakes at Carringtons by Alexandra Brown – Carringtons is a department store in a pretty seaside town. Georgie runs the handbag concession and loves to treat herself to a red velvet cupcake from the department store's café. Then the store decides to have a makeover in order to survive the recession, meaning the arrival of Maxine. Soon Georgie is fighting for her job.

4. The Naughty Girls Bookclub by Sophie Hart – Estelle runs a café but is struggling to attract customers. But the first meeting isn't the success Estelle hoped. So she suggests some erotica books to the readers. Starting off slightly unsure, the group starts to shake off its inhibitions.

5. Billy and Me by Giovanna Fletcher – Sophie didn't go to university or travel the world like other people her age. Instead she stayed in her village and found work in the local teashop. She had her reasons. Then she meets Billy, an actor with ambitions. And soon Sophie is thrust into the spotlight herself. 

6. Chocolat by Joanne Harris – Vianne Rocher arrives in the French village of Lansquenet on the wind and opens up a chocolate boutique right at the beginning of Lent, which does not go down well with the local church.

7. The Tea House on Mulbery Street by Sharon Owens – The owners of the tea rooms and the various customers, all want their loves to change. But if they want to make changes are they prepared to take the consequences?

8. Café Tropicana by Belinda Jones – Ava's ambition if to have her very own café in Bath. Then her dad is on the phone wanting her to come to Costa Rica to meet his new wife. No way was she going to travel all that way to meet her. Then her dad offers her the running of a beachfront café over there and she's on a plane.

9. The Other Woman by Siobhan McKenna – Kennedy Cafés & Chocolate Emporium is celebrating one hundred years and Owen Kennedy has decided to expand into wine. The Irish Kennedy family comes together with the Italian Boselli family and Ruby Hart, Owen's right-hand woman is leaving her troubles behind to spend a month in Italy.

10. Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe by Fannie Flagg – Idgie and Ruth run the Whistle Stop Cafe in the south of the US in the twenties. The cafe lifted the town, which was suffering in the Depression, where you could get good food and a smile for 25 cents.