Review: Kind of like those round tins of Christmas cookies, each one is a little different but all good!
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 12 21, 2013
A small-town-Christmas themed anthology with the stories slotting into the each of the author’s existing series.I’m a big Jill Shalvis fan, and a long-time follower of the Lucky Harbor series. Fortunately for me her ‘Dream a Little Dream’ [Lucky Harbor series] is the first story so I didn’t have long to wait. Take one lonely but hunky firefighter hero still grieving for his lost sister, add spunky but commitment phobic heroine. Heat well – and repeatedly – to produce a tasty romance. Essentially a second chance romance and a good read.Kristen Ashley’s Every Year [Chaos Motorcycle Club series] is a ‘finding Christmas’ story that apparently contains characters from the series. Since I have missed this series somehow, I was pleased there was enough back story provided that I avoided those ‘huh?’ moments you occasionally find when entering a series in the middle.Silent Night [Last Chance ] by Hope Ramsay has a ‘hard-luck Christmas’ theme with some nice echoes of the original Christmas story. Fate takes a hand to bring two hurting people together to find love and family under a Christmas star.I fell in love with the title for Molly Cannon’s Have Yourself a Messy Little Christmas [Everson, Texas series ]. The hero’s mother hires a professional organizer and sics her onto the hero to clean up his act and decorate for Christmas. Needless to say the hero STRONGLY resents this. [As a piler myself I admit I sympathized with the hero, the rule at my house is touch my desk and die!] Of course she wins him over, eventually…A Family for Christmas [Tallgrass series] by Marilyn Pappano  is an ‘opposites attract’ story – with a large dose of Christmas spirit provided by the heroine.Like any anthology, there are stories I loved and those that were good but not great. Each story is augmented by a comment from the author and an excerpt of one of their other works is provided at the end of the story. [It was kind of like a TV show; ‘and now a word from our sponsors…’ but I did get some leads on other stories to pursue. Since I need to give an overall rating I will have to go with ‘4’. It’s definitely worth picking up.Copy received from Netgalley and publisher for an honest review.