Reviewed by Sadonna

TITLE:  Gingerbread Mistletoe

SERIES:  Lighthouse Bay

AUTHOR:  Amy Aislin

NARRATOR:  Aaron Hokanson

PUBLISHER:  Self-published

LENGTH:  6 hours and 40 minutes

RELEASE DATE:  July 8, 2024

BLURB:

The last thing Jeff wants is to spend time with the man who totaled his car—the one he spent years restoring with his late father. But if he wants to resurrect his childhood town’s annual outdoor hockey tournament, he’s got no choice.

The last thing Mika wants is to work with the guy who took off right after the accident, without ensuring he was okay. And working together on organizing Jeff’s proposed tournament sounds like a complete nightmare. He’s got enough on his plate after surviving cancer.

Sparks fly as they’re forced to work together, but is that enough for them to set their differences aside and pull off the tournament in only two weeks? Or will they prove to be immune to the magic of Christmas?

REVIEW:

Note:  While this is the second book in this series, it works perfectly well as a standalone. In fact, I haven’t read the first book yet, but I’m about to rectify that 😉

When I read this story four years ago, I loved it.  It’s one of my most favorite holiday stories ever in this genre.  It has all the elements – a disastrous first meeting, a surprise second meeting in a return to the hometown, a grumpy CEO, a holiday market, a secret illness, a lonely holiday saved by doing things for others, small towns with big hearts – seriously this has Hallmark written all over it – rich guy who isn’t a jerk, nosy BFFs, the works!  I love it when characters get off on the wrong foot and then realize, hey, I may actually really be into this person 🙂  And that’s exactly what happens here, but I’m getting ahead of myself.

Jeff Bellmoor is on his traditional December holiday.  He’s the CEO of a Sports equipment company and he works long days in his Manhattan office the rest of the year.  He’s got a nice vacation home outside of Los Angeles on the water.  He’s also recently lost his father.  During high school, they rebuilt a classic car together – a 1956 Chevy Nomad.  Jeff keeps it at his vacation home and he loves to drive it to the beach.  After enjoying some time at the water, he heads back to his car only to hear the crunch of metal and yep, it’s his car 🙁  Jeff is devastated.  The guy who hits him, Mika Jones, is obviously upset and gives Jeff his information, but Jeff is too angry to pay much attention and drives off in a huff.

Fast forward to the next December and Jeff has decided to go back to Lighthouse Bay, the small Maine town he grew up in, but hadn’t really be back to since he left for college and his parents moved to Atlanta.  As luck would have it, his car, laptop and phone all pretty much die in succession as soon as he hits town.  He’s rented an apartment above a cute little cafe but he needs something to do.  When he was a kid, there was a hockey tournament during the holiday break and he wonders if its still going.  When he runs into Zach, the guy in charge of town events, Zach confirms that no, it’s not on the agenda.  But Jeff really wants it to be.  So he tags along with Zach to the town event HQ to talk to the guy who is in charge of the Holiday festival and events.  And who should it be but Mika Jones 😉

Jeff cannot believe it.  He tells Zach he can’t work with the guy – which doesn’t go over very well with Mika’s very protective friends who happen to be right there working on the Christmas parade floats.  So Jeff walks away.  But there is literally no way this tournament will happen if he can’t work with Mika.  So he sets about trying to win Mika over – he swears he’ll do all the work and will just coordinate with Mika.  But there is a LOT Jeff doesn’t know about Mika.  For one thing, he’s an actor on a very popular show that Jeff has never seen.  He’s also been through a health scare and is still recovering which also explains some of his friends’ protectiveness 😉

Jeff’s wooing of Mika – at first for his approval to do the hockey tournament, but then for Mika himself, is just so incredibly sweet.  It’s very funny and sweet and at first kind of flies under the radar with Mika.  Jeff senses some of Mika’s melancholy and he notices when Mika is tired or in pain.  He really pulls out all the stops to get Mika on his side and to just make Mika happy.  A happy Mika is a good thing for Jeff.  For Mika’s part, he’s impressed that Jeff is the real deal.  He’s a CEO, but he’s really down to earth and he really does want to recreate something from his childhood.  Jeff s reluctant to share all the reasons why he wants this so badly, but he has his reasons – and they are good ones.

As the planning for the hockey tournament goes on and the Christmas events go forward, Mika and Jeff spend a lot of time together.  They play pub night trivia, go on walks, visit the businesses in Lighthouse Bay – some of which have barely changed in the 30 years Jeff has been away.  Jeff’s spent so much time building his company that he ruined his marriage.  But things worked out in the end and he’s got great relationships with his grown kids and his ex-wife.  He’s also got a brother that he’s close to and his mom is doing well after losing her husband.  He’s really got nothing to complain about.  But he is lonely.  Mika senses this a lot and he’s happy to spend time with Jeff.

As the days before the hockey tournament wind down, there is a problem with some of the equipment that Jeff has ordered.  On order to have everything in please, Jeff needs to figure out a way to rectify that but also he wants to do something nice for Mika and he figures out a way to align those two goals 😀  No spoilers, but this is a really lovely part of the book.  Mika sees Jeff for who he really is 🙂   It seems, though, that there are mysterious forces at work and there just might be a way for Jeff and Mika to find their way to a future.  Together.

I loved every single thing about this book.  Amy Aislin hit it out of the park!  There are sooo many things to revel in.  First there is Jeff and Mika.  Loved that they kind of hated each other at first.  Then there’s Jeff’s wooing of Mika which was PERFECT in this quaint little Maine town.  I loved Mika’s parents – particularly his mother 😉  Then there are the friends – Zach and Holland and Clark and Dev (who feature in the other books in this series which I also recommend 😉 ).  I loved that it was literally NO BIG DEAL in any part of this story that Jeff was attracted to Mika, that he’s had a wife and had kids, but he really wanted Mika.

There were so many cute moments around Mika being a well known actor that Jeff had literally no idea about – beyond seeing a billboard which it took him a while to figure out 😀  The nostalgia elements around trying to recreate something from a happier time were really well done.  The theme of love and loss and what it means to lose a parent and how to honor that and put it in perspective and take the lessons from that relationship forward in life were just so beautiful.  Amy Aislin is an autobuy for me and this book is a clear illustration of why.

The audio performance of this book is just lovely.  This is the second book I’ve listened to from this narrator.  In full disclosure, the narrator is Canadian and that is clear in this narration.  I spent a lot of time in Canada working in a past life so this was deliciously nostalgic for me 🙂  I adore his work and this listen was a delight for me.  Mika and Jeff are very different people and I felt like the voice choices and characterizations were on point.  Jeff is a successful guy and he’s used to getting what he wants, but he’s NOT a guy who throws his weight around and I thought the way this narrator conveyed that in a confident but not overbearing tone was just right.  Mika can be a bit prickly – he’s been through a lot and again, I thought the way Mr. Hokanson conveyed that little bit of fear/melancholy/hope was perfectly performance.  I really can’t recommend this book more highly.  If you’re in the mood for a wonderful holiday story, I don’t think you can go wrong with this one.  And since many of us have been dealing with extreme heat for weeks, the description of snow and ice and fresh air hockey might even have a cooling effect 😉

RATING: 

BUY LINK:

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