This book is like a cozy cup of hot cocoa, sweet, comforting, and just what you need to get into the holiday mood.

Blake's writing style is wonderfully warm and engaging, with a knack for bringing the magic of the season to life. The way she crafts her characters makes you feel like you’re right there with them, celebrating, falling in love, and experiencing the highs and lows of the holiday season. The chemistry between the characters is sparkling, full of those little moments that make your heart skip a beat.

Thank you to Netgalley and Hachette Australia for the eARC in exchange for an honest review.

I thought this was a very sweet, queery-cheery holiday romance. I really enjoyed the second-chance romance trope - I love the emotional conflict that comes with still loving someone even though you want to hate them. I thought this was done really well, and I could feel the tension between the main characters. I also enjoyed the plot and the writing style.

The main thing that was lacking for me was the character development. Connecting with the characters is the most important part of the reading experience for me, and unfortunately I felt like they could have been fleshed out more in this book. For the first half, we only really touched on the surface of the two main characters. We spent most of the time learning about Charlotte, but I didn't feel like I really knew her. I think this was a combination of the third person writing, and also that she was emotionally closed off to everyone which made it hard to connect with as a reader too. Brighton felt even less complete, amd I think this was mainly because we spent more time with Charlotte. The characters were very complex and I definitely felt like the second half was a big improvement, but I think the first half missed its potential. Despite this, I still loved them together and I could really relate to parts of Charlotte's character. I loved all the secondary characters in this book too, however, I also think some of them at times suffered from a lack of development or time.

Overall a really enjoyable festive romance and I can't wait for December now!

This was a cute festive read from Ashley Herring Blake!

This book makes me want to pick up more titles of hers :)

Lola and Brighton were childhood sweethearts who were destined for happily ever after, that is until Brighton leaves Lola at the altar with no explanation. Five years and a comedy of coincidences later has Lola and Bright spending Christmas together. Lola wants to leave everything in the past but Brighton wants a chance to explain herself

I'm not entirely sure why, but I sort of think this might be my favourite Ashley Herring Blake novel to date. There was just something about this one that made me blow through it quickly despite being in a bit of a reading slump right now.

I really enjoyed how both girls were pursuing music but in pretty different ways, Brighton's plot with the Katies was particularly interesting but I wish we got a bit more of it. I'm a pretty vengeance-hungry person so I wasn't totally satisfied with the way that plot was resolved - not just the stolen song but Brighton being ousted from the band - it would have been nice to see the girls who didn't know the song was stolen to have a moment with Brighton later on.

I think this is probably my biggest criticism of the book in general, everything felt a little bit too surface-level. I think we needed more of an exploration of why Brighton had to leave, why Lola realised that she was in the wrong too, and more of a look into Lola's relationship with her absentee mother and how that impacted what happened with Brighton and her choices in the aftermath. It just felt like there were a lot of gold nuggets that could have been really drawn out to make the characters feel more developed and rich.

But all in al, I did really enjoy this one and I'll definitely be grabbing a physical copy to add to my AHB collection!

Thankyou to Netgalley and Hachette Australia & New Zealand for an arc in exchange for an honest review.