I really enjoyed this sweet romance that had a few twists I wasn't expecting. Well written with loveable characters - I can't wait to read more by this author!

everybody loves bella erickson in her small town of ghost falls. everyone knows her. and everyone knows that she's been in love with town sheriff nate evans since they were little kids. they also know that it's a hopeless kind of love, because nate is not one to get himself tied up with anyone.

in becoming bella, she decides it's past time to take control of her life. she wants to be with someone who wants her back. she wants to stop being the town good girl and not be bad, but not be so predictable. she's got a list of 10 things to do if you're single during the holidays and she's going to follow it and see if her life changes. because she's tired of it being the same day in and day out. she's unhappy and needs something to change.

she just didn't count on a stalker. she thought the guy was intense and maybe just came on a little strong, but when things escalate to vandalism and threats of violence nate finds himself unable to step back. this is bella. the girl he's avoided his whole life, because if he's honest she's the only one who could tie him down.

as in most small town romances, we spend a lot of time with the people of ghost falls. bella and nate are integral members of the town and they've known each other forever, so the story focuses less on building their relationship and more on changing it. but this means that they end up spending a lot of time apart. which is fine and makes sense, but a part of me prefers to see our lead couple together more than spending the novel getting their heads screwed on right alone or with other characters.

i like the town of ghost falls. and the people who inhabit it. if you are looking for small town romance with a sweet couple and a hint of suspense, you can't go wrong here.

Adored this story!! It's very well written with a great pace to the story and characters that will steal your heart.

Bella is a young woman working hard to become the woman she wants to be. More importantly she wants the people in her hometown of Ghost Falls, UT to take her seriously. Hard to do when they still think of her as that sweet little girl with a huge crush on the town bad boy. Nate Evans may be reformed and now the Sheriff of Ghost Falls but he knows he's still not good enough for the town sweetheart. He's better than the jerk she met in the bar though. And now that she has a stalker, he'll do whatever it takes to keep her safe.

A fantastic story that should go on the must read list. I highly recommend it.

Becoming Bella is the second in Sarah Heggar’s Ghost Falls series. While Positively Pippa sparkled, Becoming Bella is much more subtle. Well, it was subtle until the end and this happened, “She wanted to throw her wine at him, but it was wine, and she wanted to drink it more.” One of my all-time favorite lines. Bella is proof that sometimes we have to change to realize we are already our best self. It is only then do we find what we are truly looking for.

I voluntarily reviewed an ARC of this novel.

Everyone knows that when you live in a small town, little things you say and do when you're a child will haunt you until you're elderly. Such is the case of Bella Erikson, of Ghost Falls. Sarah Hegger's Becoming Bella will take you on Bella's journey to find herself, as a thirty-something woman whose reputation around town she's sick of hearing. She knows she's considered one of the sweet and caring small business owners of their growing town, but she's sick of hearing if she's still in love with Nate Evans, who everyone knew she had a major crush on since their elementary school days. When Nate has to rescue Bella from the danger of her own home's roof, their friendship starts to develop and change. As another man enters her life, Nate has to decide what he wants and where his priorities lie. For anyone who loves watching Hallmark's show Good Witch and a Nicholas Sparks take on dramatic romance, this book is for you!

With this being book #2 in the Ghost Falls series, I really didn't feel like I missed anything by starting with this book and not having read Positively Pippa, but I will go back and read book #1 because I enjoyed Becoming Bella so much! This book is one big reason I am glad I signed up for NetGalley because I don't know if I would have ever read Sarah Hegger had I not. Not saying that she's bad because she's definitely NOT, but I just don't know that I would have found her, with how many authors are out there right now.

I enjoyed every second of this book and it gave me all the feels! It grabbed my attention right from the start and held it through every paragraph! I'm pretty hopeful that there will be more Ghost Falls books in the future! I love small town Romance books because I'm from a small town and I guess I can just relate to them!

Ever since she was six, Bella had a crush on Nate. Which never ever worked out well for her. And now, years later, Bella has a plan to change her life and show everyone in town she is no longer the old Bella, and that she certainly has moved on long ago from that crush.

Nate is the sheriff in town and even though he has always been attracted to Bella, she falls in a category of women he will never touch. She is too good for him and he is not good boyfriend material. But when Bella has a stalker his protective feelings surface.

I liked the writing and the characters. I always have a weakness for sheriffs. However, the story was a bit slow to start and I never felt the real romance or sparkle. The last part of the book was the part I enjoyed most!

This will appeal to lovers of small town romance.

This is my first book by Sarah Hegger.

What I liked:
The writing style
The characters
Phi and Liz
Part of a series: The Ghost Falls Series
Standalone
HEA

I look forward to reading more from this author.

This was lovely! The main characters in this, the second novel in the Ghost Falls series, are small town sweetheart Bella and reformed bad boy turned sherif Nate. Bella has had a pretty epic crush on Nate since childhood, and small towns being what they are everybody knows about it. Nate is convinced his less than stellar past leaves him unworthy of her, so has never encouraged her infatuation. Tired of being the subject of gossip and pity, Bella decides it's time for her to move on with her life, and that's when things really start to happen!

It really helped that I liked both of the main characters so much. It would have been really easy to make Bella pathetic and Nate an ass, but instead Hegger creates characters who we understand and empathise with. Bella fell in love with Nate long before she knew what love really was, and the more we see of him the more we understand why she did so. Not only is he good looking (which always helps!) but underneath his gruff exterior is a really sweet person who is just trying to do the right thing. As for Nate he is well aware that Bella is a genuinely kind person and he just wants to protect that sweetness both from himself and others. Another thing I really liked was that though what I have described are the broad strokes of their characters they aren't perfect (which I often find annoying). We saw in Positively Pippa and again here that Bella has a tendency to be judgemental. She assumed the worst of Pippa in the previous book, though redeemed herself once she realised how wrong she was. Here she does the same to her neighbour, Liz. However she has grown enough as a character to see her faults for what they are and manages to forge a stronger friendship because of that. Nate is, ultimately, an emotional coward. However when he realises what he's doing he sets out to give Bella all the love and devotion she has shown to him throughout the years and I loved it!

I loved the plot as well. It was a lot more exciting than I was expecting. Adam was quite frankly terrifying and the final confrontation was chilling!!! When I requested this book is thought I was getting a fairly traditional small town romance (which would have been fine) but instead what I got was a really well written romantic suspense which was a lovely surprise!

Though, as I've previously mentioned, this is the second book in the Ghost Falls series, it can quite easily be read as a stand alone. The previous story is referred to occasionally but it is easy to understand the context. All in all I wouldn't hesitate to recommend this to anyone looking for a well written and well executed romance with a wonderfully gripping plot!

*ARC provided by NetGalley and the publisher in return for an honest review*

I have been a fan of Sarah Hugger's book for several years and I was so excited for this book. The story is about Bella Erikson, whose been the unofficial sweetheart of Ghost Falls, Utah. Ever since Nate Evans dipped her braids in purple paint in the first grade, he’s been the guy she wants. Nate knows he’s not the best option for sweet Bella. He knows that Bella's new suitor is not good enough for her. Bella’s new suitor turns stalker, Nate has to protect Bella. I hope you enjoy this book as much as I did.

This author and this book are exactly why I signed up for NetGalley. I love to discover and promote authors that I never would have found if not for NetGalley--they would have been lost to me in the vast sea of books on Amazon. And every once in a while, I read a book by a new-to-me-author that makes me add that author to my favorites list. Ms. Hegger will be going on that list. I enjoyed every second of this book. The author's writing style is fresh, engaging, and fun. The characters are well developed and incredibly likeable--and not just Nate and Bella, but all the secondary characters too, like Liz, Jo, Daniel, and so forth. The story itself doesn't follow a typical cookie-cutter romance plot; it moves well beyond that, which was refreshing. I'm finding it difficult to put into words what it was that made this so engaging, but it absolutely was. I devoured every word, and I didn't want it to end. I felt like I was friends with these people, and I didn't want to lose that connection. That is not common for me, and I am in awe of the author's ability to create such a captivating fantasy world that sucked me right in and made me not want to leave. I will be anxiously awaiting future books in this series!

I was instantly engaged with Bella, and was interested in her development with relationships. Her friendship with Liz was endearing. 'Becoming Bella' had a level of suspense that kept me involved, and it touched on social issues that are current. My problem was that I just couldn't reconcile 'sweet' Bella with the coarseness of language and sexually graphic situations in the book. The town of Ghost Falls, however, is interesting, and I expect I will visit it again.

I was bored. I really didn't like the hero. He felt she was too good for him but I just didn't like him.

I loved POSITIVELY PIPPA, so when book two, BECOMING BELLA, arrived, I couldn’t wait to read it. And I did. In one continuous setting!

Bella Erickson has been in serious lust/like/love with Sheriff Nate Evans since they were in school together. When they were growing up, Nate had a hellion reputation and Bella had the ultimate good girl rep. One she still has today. But she wants to change that in a big way, so instead of waiting to make a new Year’s resolution, she adopts a Christmas list of things to do to change herself. Volunteer, decorate, do something you wouldn’t ordinarily do. When she goes to a single’s night at a local bar and meets a handsome stranger, Bella figures her list just might be a good thing to get her out of her lifelong desire to be with Nate.

As it turns out, not so much.

Nate’s rep didn’t hurt him in the long run and now that he’s the Sheriff, he figures he got a lucky break. He’s always known Bella has a thing for him, but because she was the ultimate good girl, he felt he wasn’t in her league and never wanted to hurt her by loving her and leaving her – which is his way. So, he stayed away from her.

But now Bella’s got a stalker disrupting her life and the potential threats that come along with that have made it impossible for him to avoid her. He’s the Sheriff. She’s in need of protection. He knows he should let someone else handle it, but… he just can’t.

I loved this book. The characters were well formed – some of them we’ve met in the first book, some were new. The plot moved along at a perfect pace and the love story evolved in a way I simply adore.
5 well deserved stars for BECOMING BELLA.