Review: Right Under Your Nose by Holly Tierney-Bedord

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Rating: PG

Genre: Novella, Romance

Score: 3.75 stars

Page Count: 117

Book #1 of Untiled series

Publisher: Kindle

Published: November 13th, 2015

Ariadne Daniels seems to have it all: A successful career as a pastry chef, a Victorian home in a trendy neighborhood, and her dedicated boyfriend Scott who she's been with for years.

Her life is great until the day she stops by Scott's apartment to surprise him and finds out that he's not so dedicated to her after all. Shocked and too depressed to celebrate, she decides to skip Christmas. Her best friend Jess does his part to convince her otherwise, but Ariadne's determined to wallow in her misery, at least until spring.

Life has other plans for her, however. Some helpful meddling from a new friend at a local bookstore, along with some questionable behavior on the part of Jess’s girlfriend, turn Ariadne’s ho-hum holiday plans on their head.

Review:

PROS:

1. Special thanks to Lola over at Lola's Blog Tours for sending me a review copy of this book in exchange for an honest review! The first thing that caught my eye about this book was the lovely cover! I just adore book covers that look like drawings or illustrations so I when I read the synopsis of this novella, it gave me another reason to read it. I wanted to get this review out as soon as possible since this novella is a Christmas story so here you go! 

2. I really liked the characters in this book, especially one of the side characters whom we meet a little later in the book who is an elderly man that owns a bookstore. I thought the main character, Ariadne, was a hard working young woman who's pretty pissed off at her ex-boyfriend and therefore, decides she'll be skipping Christmas this year and avoid anything that's merry or holly jolly. She did come across as a bit self-centered and immature, acting like a teen trapped in a woman's body, but I felt she redeemed herself as she learned throughout the book that there's a lot more going on around her than she realizes. I also really liked Jess because he seemed like a really loyal and funny friend and the romance between the two was nice and sweet, maybe needing just a little more fleshing out but still, I enjoyed it. 

Source

3. I loved that this novella was mainly dialogue and maybe it was a creative touch or simply because it is a very short book but either way, I really enjoyed it. The dialogue kept the story moving, only broken up by little simple descriptions of the settings, people, emotions etc. I've never really read a book that was mainly dialogue so it was a nice change. Even novellas that I've read before I felt could've done without so much description and I think this book was a great example of limiting description to only what is needed. It was a fun holiday themed book that is obviously perfect for this time of year. It's a quick read, really entertaining, and it made me want to visit a bookstore. 

I didn't give this book a five-star rating because while I thought it was fun and quick, funny and light, I did wish it was a few pages longer. I thought the ending could have used another chapter or two to tie everything together nicely and avoid feeling rushed. I thought the book had a nice pace throughout until the ending that felt a little sudden. I'm curious to see what happens in the sequel to this novella and am excited to hopefully see more of this author's work. 

You Can Purchase The Book Here:

Amazon

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About The Author:

Holly Tierney-Bedord writes contemporary fiction. She is the author of Surviving Valencia, Right Under Your Nose, Bellamy's Redemption, and Coached, as well as children's books. She lives in Madison, Wisconsin.

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Read on, bookworms! See you in the next chapter!

Let It Snow by John Green, Maureen Johnson and Lauren Myracle

Let It Snow by John Green, Maureen Johnson and Lauren Myracle

Rating: PG

Genre: Romance, YA Fiction

Score: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Page Count: 352

Stand Alone Novel

Publisher: Speak: The Penguin Group

Published: October, 8, 2008

 

An ill-timed storm on Christmas Eve buries the residents of Gracetown under multiple feet of snow and causes quite a bit of chaos. One brave soul ventures out into the storm from her stranded train and sets off a chain of events that will change quite a few lives. Over the next three days one girl takes a risky shortcut with an adorable stranger, three friends set out to win a race to the Waffle House (and the hash brown spoils), and the fate of a teacup pig falls into the hands of a lovesick barista. A trio of today's bestselling authors- John Green, Maureen Johnson and Lauren Myracle- brings all the magic of the holidays to life in three hilarious and charming interconnected tales of love, romance and kisses that will steal your breath away.

 

Review:

Pros:

1. I thought since Christmas is right around the corner, literally tomorrow, I thought I would pick up a holiday read this month. I really loved this holiday read for many reasons but I'll just try to name a few so as not to make this review way too long for you beautiful people!

 

2. I'm a huge John Green fan and was excited to find this book in which he wrote a short story in but I was also excited to see that Maureen Johnson also had a short story in this book. I love her book 13 Little Blue Envelopes and I was excited to read her story as well. I've never read anything by Lauren Myracle but after reading her story, I fell in love with her writing! All three stories were hilarious and romantic as well as fun and just so darn cute! It was so hard trying to determine my favorite short story because of that! The writing for the stories was just so easy and funny to read, and I'm in love with this book. I'll definitely be reading this again next Winter!

 

3. The characters were all so cute and loveable. For the authors to have written such heartwarming characters in just 100 pages each, I'd say that's just pretty amazing! It was hard to choose my favorite characters as well because they were all so enjoyable to read about and I loved all of them, from the first page to the last. They were funny, sarcastic, caring and loyal in the funniest yet sweetest ways. I honestly could go on for hours talking about these characters!

 

4. This book had such a heartwarming and romantic Christmas feel to it that I would definitely recommend this book to anyone who loves the holiday season regardless of it is indeed the holiday season. If you're late to the holiday reading party, I would still recommend this book for a Winter read. It's perfect for someone who loves a cute, funny and romantic read that has just a little holiday flare to it.

 

5. One thing I just really, really loved above all was when all the characters interweaved with each other. I just thought that that was a perfect way to connect the stories together. I also really loved how the characters ended up meeting each other as well and thought that was a perfect touch to this amazing book!

 

Age Recommendation: 12+

 

I hope you guys enjoyed this book review! If you have any other book requests you would like me to review, just leave a comment or send me an email! Read on bookworms! See you in the next chapter! Oh, and happy holidays!