e-Audio, 05:59:50
Narrated by: Inés del Castillo
Release Date: September 27, 2022
Published by: Simon & Schuster Audio
Read from: October 6-7, 2022
Stand-alone
Source: Simon & Schuster (I received a copy of this book from LibroFM and the Publisher in exchange for a just and honest review. This did nothing to influence my review.)
TW: Death of a Grandparent (Recounted on page)
For Readers Interested In: Contemporary Romance, Realistic Fiction, Holidaze (Christmas), YAA teen girl gets the perfect second try at a first kiss in this hilarious, romp-filled young adult romantic comedy perfect for fans of Jenna Evans Welch and Hallmark Christmas movies.
Francie was born in a stable. Really. Granted, it was the deluxe model with the light-up star on the roof, one of the many Christmas items for sale at her family’s Hollydale Holiday Shop. Their holiday gift empire also includes the Santa School, which was founded by Francie’s beloved grandpa, who recently passed away.
Francie’s always loved working in the shop, but lately Aunt Carole has been changing everything with her ideas for too-slick, Hollywood-inspired Santas and horrible holiday-themed employee uniforms. Aunt Carole’s vision will ruin all the charm and nostalgia Francie loves about her family’s business…unless she does something about it.
But this winter is about more than preserving the magic of Christmas. Francie is saving up for a car and angling to kiss the cute boy who works at the tree lot next door—hopefully it will be good enough to wipe her fiasco of a first kiss from her memory.
As the weather outside gets more and more frightful, can Francie pull off the holiday of her dreams?
*MY THOUGHTS*
As a mood reader, I was very worried I was going to DNF this. Here (USA) it is in the middle of spooky season just before Halloween. I’ve been wanting to read paranormals and thrillers. But I had an ARC of this one, and I didn’t want to get too far behind…. So I read it…. And I thouroughly enjoyed it.
Frankie (as in Frankincense) has been surrounded by Christmas her entire life. She was even born in a manger. Her and her family own the Hollydale Holiday Shop and Santa School. She’s always had fun there, that is until her Aunt Carole comes trying to change everything. She’s been trying to save for a car, preserve Christmas and trying to redeem her first kiss. Can she do all of this and save the school from her Aunt at the same time?
Ok so this was a cute little book. Too bad it was all over the place. And by it I mean the plot. There was a point where they were raising money for a book to a kid in a shelter like place, a romance that popped up with the tree guy, the aunt stuff, and there was more. It just seemed like a lot was happening and it wasn’t even 6 hours long. Very weird. BUT somehow it worked? I wasn’t ever bored and I got sucked into it and yeahhhh. It was a lot, but it was good.
The romance was cute, but I wanted it to have more of a focus in the story. I don’t know if it was because I wasn’t really invested or if there was just 55184981 other things going on in the book. But I did like him. He was very cute and seemed very shy. I wanted to know more about him tho. He always had to go and help at the tree farm. We don’t learn more about him until towards the end.
The holiday setting was amazing tho. I LOVED how the author made all these puns and put all these kitchy Christmas things in this book. I know when people say kitchy it’s usually bad, but this one was actually cute. And the costumes and store and the school and just everything. I always love when books really dig into the setting. I’m from somewhere where it hardly snows, so seeing how all of this was done was just really fun.
Was I in the mood for this? I didn’t think so, but as it turns out, I’m always in the mood for books that are like Hallmark Christmas movies. Especially when they’re short and have so much going on that you can’t help but keep turning pages. Definitely a book I would like to see on screen!
Overall, I give this
