The Trouble With Mistletoe by Jennifer Snow

Since leaving Brookhollow and her fiancé, Luke Dawson, twelve years earlier, Victoria Mason hasn't looked back. She's traded the small-town dream of marriage, kids and family Christmas dinners for late nights working at a high-powered acquisitions firm, lunches at trendy New York restaurants and jet-set vacations on the slopes. 

So her latest work assignment, to acquire Brookhollow's sporting-goods store, poses a challenge for Victoria, in more ways than one. Because it's almost Christmas, and she's got other holiday plans. And the owner is reluctant to sell. And the owner is Luke. She needs to wrap up the deal before she gets caught up in her old life and her old love...or becomes trapped under the mistletoe. Again.


I read this book for a challenge which was, for this week, to finish a Christmas-themed book. My initial reaction was to be apprehensive about doing it because I thought it was too early to start reading these books. But I went ahead and did it anyway.

By the time I was finished reading this book though, I was grinning like an idiot. When I got to the last page, it left me nothing but good vibes. It was good to finally realized that I didn't need extreme situations or plotlines to have a convincingly good story. (Wow, these still exist!) I have probably buried myself in too much heavy romances that I thought this was a breath of fresh air.

I loved Luke. I loved that he was upfront with things that matter. Although Victoria wasn't really my most favorite character, I was a bit admiring of the fact that she really went for her dreams despite the costly sacrifices that she made. I don't think a lot of people in reality can do what she did. It was admirable that she really went for her goals but at at the same time, it was kind of sad because why couldn't she have made some sort of compromise so that she could have it all? But I guess life doesn't always work like that.

Nevertheless, this was a great read because of its simplicity. Sometimes, less is really more. But it was also funny, fast-paced, and more realistic than many books out there. Love, love this. And seriously, who doesn't love second-chance books, huh? Blame it on this book because now I feel like I can read a Christmas-themed book every week until February.


Final verdict: 9/10. Great read.