Thanks Netgalley for a arc copy of this book for a honest review.. 


A Winter In Rose is a love story that I fell in love with though it was  Predictable I still enjoyed the story brought up either many emotions I love when stories can to that. A 5 star read 



Happy Reading 📚

Lisa

The plot of this book looked attractive enough to request for it. But I found it difficult to read.
The way the author used to go from introspection to retelling ,to introspection again was not my idea of a good reading. However, I believe other readers will find it more than good and that's the treasure literature offers to readers: variety and different points of view.
I wish the author the best with this title.

Thank you Netgalley for the chance to read this book in exchange for an honest review.

I was attracted to this book because of the setting – a Washington state flower farm. I thought it would be an interesting storyline for a woman’s fiction novel. Unfortunately I discovered that the author’s style and my idea for a good read did not mesh.

Eliza is on the brink of burn-out – physically, emotionally and financially. In the matter of a few short years her father committed suicide, her mother had a stroke, her husband/business partner died and her 6 year old daughter is traumatized by the loss of her father. She bears all of this loss while struggling to make her dream of owning a successful flower enterprise a reality. To top all this off, ICE shows up unannounced to take her foreman into custody to deport him for being in the country illegally. In her desperation she agrees to hire a sexy stranger as a temporary foreman. Julien is passing through town on his way to Canada and has his own demons to address. Injured in an oil rig accident that cost him a leg, he fled his home and family business in Louisiana to escape the suffocating concerns about his recovery from family and friends.

The sexual attraction (lust) is apparent from the very first encounter between Eliza and Julian. The sexual tension drives much of the storyline, but rather than finding it an engaging element, it deteriorates into a morass of mixed messages/intentions/innuendos from Eliza. She can’t decide if she wants to maintain the boundary of boss/employee or surrender to her physical needs. Julien also vacillates between staying to help her out with the farm and heading back out of the road.

I found the characters basically unlikeable with the exception of Eliza’s daughter, Skye. While I enjoy strong female protagonists, Eliza is so stubborn that it is hard to feel much empathy for her. Claire, Eliza’s mother, meddles in Eliza’s life to the degree that she is an impediment to her daughter’s success and happiness. The attitudes of the two teenage interns also bring a bit of a sour note to the enterprise. Finally, I had a hard time embracing how fixated Julien is on her backside in jeans, which gets mentioned so many times it became laughable.

I did not enjoy this novel. It had some important life issues to be explored, but the dominance of the sexual focus, coupled with the overall dysfunctional relationships, detracted from the value.

My thanks to the author, the publisher, and NetGalley for the privilege of reviewing an eARC. The opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

This review is being posted immediately to my GoodReads account and will be posted on Amazon upon publication.

⭐️⭐️⭐️ A Winter Rose by Amy Craig shows a lot of promise. I like the premise of Julian, a “handicapped” (missing one leg former oil rigger) trying to find purpose in life traveling by motorcycle through the Pacific NW. When Julian stops in a small town for some hardware, he meets Eliza, the widowed owner of a flower farm. Through some awkward manipulations, he becomes her farm foreman since Eliza’s current help was just arrested by ICE. She’s also taking care of her Mom who survived a stroke and one precocious daughter. Sparks (the good kind) fly at their first meeting. These two try to work together during the rough winter weather as Eliza’s dormant flower fields get prepped for Spring. The flowers are pretty much a metaphor for their relationship. Both have had their hearts broken and their dormant hearts are waiting to bloom again. I would love to see this story a little more developed without the constant mixed signals. I would like it if Julian quit saying Yes, ma’am every two seconds although It would make a good drinking game. Also, I think once you have sampled Eliza’s “lady-crop”, you can use first names and kill the polite ma’am talk. A little fine-tuning and this could be a 5-star romance novel.
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. Thank you to NetGalley for this free ARC, but my thoughts and review are my own and without bias.