Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ ½
I loved this young adult christmas romance! After learning that it was a young adult novel, I was hesitant only because some young adult novels can be a little childish or dumbed down a bit. But this one wasn't at all! It had the perfect amount of young teenage essence.
I liked the main character a lot! Bailey works in a book store over Christmas time (and throughout the year) and is looking for her perfect, almost Hallmark Movie scripted, Christmas romance. She is all about Christmas in every way you can think; movies, cookies, decorations, tree decorating, traditions, mistletoe, gift wrapping, etc. She really made this book festive. While you can tell she is young, she isn't young and foolish, and I really admire and appreciate how the author wrote her character. The pop culture references were a plus, mostly because I'm still young enough to understand and enjoy them.
One random thing about this book that stuck with me was The Cookie Swap. Not anything that happened during it, but how good of an idea that it (pandemic permitting...)! I would love to know my neighbors well enough to do something like that, or maybe have it be a friend thing! Get together, everyone makes their favorite kind of unique Christmas cookie and bring a tin of their own to take home their favorites from other people! Like, I am definitely going to steal this idea in the future because it sounds like so much fun!
The best part of this book for me was the ending. It totally took me by surprise and added an element of Christmas spirit that I really enjoyed.
I would definitely recommend this teenage Christmas romance!
Received an arc from NetGalley for an honest review