Wishing you a Hap-PIE Christmas!!

There’s just over two weeks left for you to make someone’s Christmas a truly Hap-PIE one by getting the pie lover in your life a copy of Life of Pies!

Over 20 boxes of the book have now gone out and the feedback has been incredible. It’s truly heartwarming for me personally to know that it has been so well received.

Life of Pies is a light hearted travelogue following your intrepid author who spent two years scouring the country for perfect pies.

With 400 pies eaten and exactly 314 reviewed from all over the country, it was a mammoth quest. I had big pies, small pies, burnt pies, round pies, square pies, semi-frozen pies, shortcrust pies, puff pastry pies, meat, veggie pies and even a few that it transpired weren’t pies at all.

I travelled thousands of miles and spent thousands of pounds facing all manner of embarrassing, unfortunate and even near death situations (poetic licence klaxon).

I probably went slightly mad during the course of my project and certainly drove my missus constantly up the wall with my obsessive, compulsive and often downright selfish nature but I succeeded in answering my question.

With an intricate scoring system and awards, league tables and a full index at the end the book serves as a great explorative reference guide to find the nation’s best pie shops.

The book is a total of 388 pages long and there’s also an extensive colour section featuring photographs of some of the best and indeed strangest pies I encountered.

Life of Pies is now on sale via Amazon and also directly from the shop on this website. If you order via either of these two methods, you’ll get it sent out to you first class usually within 48 hours.

Paul’s Christmas Pie

You can also find it on the shelves on the Wigan branch of Waterstones and at a handful of other bookstores across the North West. If your local shop doesn’t stock it, please ask them!

Priced at just £9.99 it represents excellent value for a cracker of a read and also a lifelong pastry based companion. But don’t just take my word for it, have a look at what some of the reviews say:

THE REVIEWS

“Absolutely brilliant book! This is one of the funniest books I’ve laid my eyes on in a long long while. Do yourself a favour and order this, you won’t regret it :)” – MR I J GRAHAM

“Dan Brown meets Mary Berry” – MR N W F

“Superb read, served with a helping of Northern humour.” – Darren Norton

“Part good pie guide, part travelogue, part “An Adrian Mole for northern football fans”, like lamb, potato and shortcrust, it’s the perfect recipe for a book.” – Alan Moore

“Much more than a review of the nation’s pies, read this book if you like a good travelogue and a good laugh-out-loud humour book.” – Carol Dean

“Loved this- if you like pies it’s an absolute Godsend, if you don’t like pies it’s still a cracking book, a breezy, light-hearted travelogue that doesn’t take itself too seriously.” – Neil Tague

“My husband is an idiot” – Mrs E Tarbuck, Wigan

“Cracking book! The author travels around the country like a modern day George Bradshaw, if Bradshaw liked pies which he probably did as he came from Lancashire as well. I fully expect Michael Portillo to follow in Mr Tarbuck’s footsteps once he’s exhausted his railway guide.” – Tony Topping

“How can I not give this five stars? It’s a book about pies for God’s sake!…..not just a book about pies but it is seasoned with just the right amount of humour for you to enjoy the book even if you don’t eat pies.” – Shed

“A good fun book, the perfect Christmas gift. The author conveys his passion, obsession, downright craziness at travelling the country with his Michael Winner style dictaphone, chopping board, knife and camera documenting and reviewing pies. I shall never be forced to buy sub-standard pies again. Thanks Martin.” – Andy Brown

“He’s still not put the bloody Christmas decorations up!” – Mrs E.Tarbuck, Wigan

“How interesting and funny can a book about a person going round the country and eating pies be? Answer very interesting and very funny. A good fun read that will soon have you hunting out pies yourself.” – Seb White

“Brilliant read, well written and very funny. Best read with pie and a can…” – Peter Houghton