This was the first novel that I wrote back in 2001 when I first moved to Spain to live. I had written short stories before and non-fiction health books, but felt the need to bring a little romance and humour into my writing.. the result was the semi-autobiographical Just an Odd Job Girl.

About the book

At 50 Imogen had been married for over 20 years, and was living in a big house, with money to spare. Suddenly she is traded-in for a younger model, a Fast-Tracker.

Devastated, she hides away and indulges in binge eating. But then, when hope is almost gone, she meets a new friend and makes a journey to her past that helps her move on to her future.

Last time  Imogen gets settled in to her new job at Killbilly Hotel certain that with her Aussie staff, there will be some adventures ahead..

Chapter Seventeen – The Opening Weekend Party

As predicted, the next week was extremely busy with last minute cleaning, deliveries and smoothing off my Australian staffs’ rough edges. There was no problem with their attitude, to either work or to serving guests, but sometimes their language and standard of dress left something to be desired. For example, all the girls took the hems up on their uniform skirts, leaving vast expanses of exposed, tanned thighs. I have no doubt that our male guests might have appreciated the sight, especially when said females bent over to place trays on coffee tables, but I was sure that the females guests might not be so appreciative. Luckily, they had only tacked the hems up. This was fairly obvious as the large, red cotton stitches stood out from the black material of the skirts. After some persuasion, the hems came down but I dreaded to think about what other ‘enhancements’ would be made to the rest of the uniform over the season. I would have to deal with that when it happened.

The boys said that they were most uncomfortable in their uniforms of black trousers, white shirts and black bow ties. They were more at home in surfing shorts and T-shirts. Their regulation black lace-up shoes were a major problem. They were used to wearing sandals or going barefoot, and I winced in sympathy as I watched them breaking the shoes in over the first couple of weeks. Thankfully they were all good-natured and I did not anticipate too many problems with them. There were a number of occasions during that first season when I would have quite happily locked them in the attic and thrown away the key.

I did not have long to wait for the first major incident, and in fact, it was not the staff that caused the original problem but they certainly added their own unique touch to it.

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