Character Profile: Laura Huntley

Laura Huntley, the heroine of A Little Treat on Honey Street, a cosy romance set in Hampshire, grew up in Basingstoke with her parents, Lou and Cath. She was sixteen when her parents separated. Lou went to live in Canada with his new partner ‘Batface’ (actually called Karen) and Cath, to make ends meet, went to teach abroad. First in Dubai and then Thailand, where she now still lives.

Laura Huntley, heroine of A Little Treat on Honey Street (DeepAI)

Rather than disrupt Laura’s schooling by sending her to boarding school, or taking her abroad, it was agreed that she should live with her paternal grandmother, Mary Huntley, in Tillingham until she was able to be independent. Laura and Mary had a close bond and saw each other often, so it was a practical arrangement. It meant that Laura could finish her GCSEs at her school in Basingstoke. She moved to St Swithun’s school in Alton for sixth form.

Her parents breaking up and effectively abandoning her at a seminal moment in her life had a big emotional impact on her and she became insecure and desperate to please people. She leaned heavily on her grandmother for emotional support and advice, while also getting involved with the smoking-drinking set at school. She began to feel at odds with her Christian faith, which had also been shaken by her parents break-up and she gradually became less involved with the church, although she would often go the Sunday Service so as not to upset her grandmother.

She wasn’t a complete tearaway, though. She studied, helped her grandmother with the housework and did lots of baking, for which she became famous throughout Tillingham as she often supplied baked goods for the church coffee mornings.

When she finished her A-levels she had a part-time job in a café in Basingstoke, which meant she had some money in her pockets and evenings free. So she was over at the Arms, drinking and playing pool most evenings. When James Irving-McAuley and turned up with a couple of his posh Winchester friends, Laura admitted to her friend Micky that she thought James was a dish. Micky agreed but was quite sure he wouldn’t stand a chance with James – he definitely looked straight. Micky persuaded Laura to challenge James to a game of pool as a way of chatting him up. When she suggested it, James laughed patronisingly and agreed. He certainly wasn’t expecting the whipping she gave him – after years of practise she was a bit of a champion. The pub regulars enjoyed watching him being beaten, but James wasn’t going to let the opportunity pass him by and asked Laura out.

She was thrilled; she knew James was the son of Sir Jason and Lady Susan Irving-McAuley from the Tillingford Manor Farm and had never dreamed that someone like hm would ask an ordinary girl like her out. They rushed into a passionate affair that lasted all summer, until she went to Reading University to start reading Law and he went back to his second year at Oxford. Then she never heard from him again – she phoned, she messaged, she emailed, she wrote. She even went up to the farm to find him during the Christmas holidays but he aired her completely. She could see from OK! and HELLO! that his social life hadn’t slowed down – if anything it had speeded up and she tortured herself watching him parading a string of glamorous girlfriends before the public eye.

But eventually she got over it and had a couple of nice-but-dull boyfriends. Another law student called Ben, a relationship which fizzled out in her third year, and Mark, a data analyst she met at MegaCorp (where she had joined the graduate trainee scheme) who never had time to see her. Her mid-twenties were a dating desert as her work took over. It was only when she managed to buy a flat and Nadia, her bubbly lodger, came into her life that things changed. Nadia was a complete breath of fresh air and persuaded Laura, despite her long hours to get herself back on the circuit. She had a few dates, but nothing came of it, but she did come back out of her shell thanks to Nadia’s coaxing.

When Laura was promoted to work with Rob Steel, who all the single ladies of MegaCorp acknowledged as hot property, it wasn’t long before their relationship spilled over into something altogether more heated and they became an item.

When we meet Laura in A Little Treat on Honey Street, she and Rob are starting to talk about moving in together, but under the surface, Laura is burning out and questioning her life’s direction. Will Rob be able to support her and help her find her way, or does her path lie in another direction?

A Little Treat on Honey Street - Front Cover (Berni Stevens)