Reviewed by Annika

TITLE: Finding Yuletide Karol

SERIES: Advent Calendar: Homemade for the Holidays

AUTHOR: L.A. Merrill

PUBLISHER: Dreamspinner Press

RELEASE DATE: December 1, 2019

LENGTH: 39 pages

BLURB:

Fifty years ago, during the Vietnam War, Lee Elbridge fell in love with an Army cook nicknamed Yuletide Karol, but they haven’t seen each other since.

Now, led by a clue in an old cookbook, Lee sets off on a road trip to find his lost love. He arrives on Karol’s upstate New York farm to find preparations for a handfasting in full swing, and is mistaken for the wedding planner’s assistant. As Lee is roped into folding hemp napkin goats and mashing fresh sweet potatoes, he is welcomed by Karol’s large, eccentric family of witches and pagans. When Lee and Karol finally get a moment alone, Lee tells him the truth, but it will take more than a little Yuletide magick to bring them together again after almost a lifetime.

REVIEW:

What an amazing love story! It was beyond beautiful. It took only a few sentences of this book to completely hook me and hold me captive for the duration and when it ended I felt it was too soon.

Lee and Karol met in Vietnam during the war, Lee a soldier and Karol the army cook. Karol pulled Lee away from the brink of despair and made him bake sun cakes with him. Talked with him. They might only have spent that day together, but in that single day they fell head over heels in love. Sadly, being 1969 and the army, nothing could come of it there and then (so completely unfair if you ask me). So Karol made Lee a promise

I’ll kiss you when the war is over

Only the war ended, and no Karol was in sight. Couldn’t be found anywhere. No matter how hard and how much Lee looked he couldn’t find the man that saved his life that day. Whom he fell in love with over sun cakes and a dance. So time passed like it has a tendency to do, and when we meet Lee it’s been fifty years since Vietnam and he’s still as much in love now as he was back then.

Gah, Lee broke me with his loneliness. Having so much yet so little. Having been in love with the same man for fifty years, but having to luck finding him. Until one night, when his assistant gave him a vintage cookbook for his collection that contained the recipe for sun cake with a note from Karol, a last name and a clue where to find him. And he set of to do just that.

I’ve been looking for him for fifty years

This book might only be 39 pages long, but what an amazing 39 pages they were. With a few sentences Merrill gives us so much history, so much love, so much pain. You will cry happy tears and sad tears. You will smile and feel that warmth of love jumping off the pages. The rollercoaster of feelings Merrill takes you on is incredible, I don’t know if I’ll stop spinning any time soon.

RATING:

BUY LINKS: 

Dreamspinner Press

Amazon