Just for December by Laura Jane Williams
Just for December by Laura Jane Williams: review
Dear reader,
To Start with, thank you so much for the lovely girls
at Avon Harper Collins for gifting me this proof around the holidays!
This book was absolutely delightful, and extremely
well timed. I cracked open this book on the same day the skies decided to
comply with Michael Bublé and while it might not be a white Christmas, as the
rain seems to have washed it away now, it made to be pretty idyllic conditions to
read this book.
I went into this book feeling festive and ready for something
to give me all the fuzzy Christmas feelings, which it provided along with a lot
more feelings than I predicted.
Williams manages to craft cliches and worn-out tropes
to make them seem like nothing of the sort and in fact- revive them. Enemies to
lovers has not been done so humanly in a very long time, and all you have to do
to see that statement holds meaning is scroll through my other reviews and see
that the enemies to lover’s trope is pretty much all I read.
Our characters are beautifully human, and extremely
likable for all their well-designed faults. Eve was a cuddly sheltered writer
who didn’t dote or bat her eyelashes to the point where she was no longer a
heroin in her own novel, and Duke was the most modern man I’ve ever
read through. The involvement of his therapist was a little side tale I thought really added value to his personality, though she could have been
given a lot more of a voice! The character development for both characters was seamless
which is ridiculously rare in a romance were character development rarely
exists enough to note.
The plot was very well done too! In fact, majority of
the plot existed outside of the romance of the two characters and mainly on
their development. Whilst sometimes, I did crave more romance between those two
characters than we received particularly in the first half, it comes together
perfectly for our ending, which is about as whimsy and warm as you could ask a
romance ending to be.
Our side characters as well have to be mentioned in this
review, as they were also potent in personality and individuality. Magda for example
was a lovable and loud best friend; as a character she made herself known to
the reader and doesn’t disappear into the background of the plot. In fewer
words, a perfectly set recipe for a not-so-side-kick side character.
And what a setting for a romance! I spent most of my
time reading this book attempting to convince my boyfriend that we’d go on a
trip to the German Christmas market next year inspired by this book. There was
no neglect of description of the setting Williams chose, which I absolutely
love when an author focuses on! I hate it when an author picks a beautiful
country to enhance the themes of their book and then completely forgets to use it
to their advantage, to enhance their reader’s experience. Williams did not make
this mistake, and for it the book was a million times more festive!
I’ll finish this review with one of my margins notes I
jotted down whilst cozied up with this book on one of those snowy days: Cute,
very cute- All the feels and just the right amount of Love Actually.
You get the gist x
Merry Christmas!
Until next time,
Issy.
Avon link: Avon – HarperCollins
Publishers UK
Twitter: @avonbooksuk @laurajaneauthor
