https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/242738968-one-snowy-swedish-christmas
I picked this holiday book up from Book Sirens and I appreciate being able to be part of so many different ARC teams through this site. I enjoy a good holiday romance and I saw that there were only a few spots left so I wanted to grab one of the spots before it was no longer available and that was on me not on the author for not describing their book well enough, I had briefly scanned over the blurb and it sounded like it might be kind of interesting.
Anyways as far as the story goes Casey is from LA she has always felt kind of adrift around the holidays her mom and dad got divorced when she was a child her dad remarried and started a new family which she for reasons it didn't really go into didn't feel apart of... from the way the story sounded it felt like maybe her dad was "trying" but Casey felt left out since she wasn't there all the time and felt her dad had moved on without her and her mom with a new family... as far as I'm concerned she could have tried harder maybe (?) the story doesn't really go too far into this but basically since she doesn't feel like she has a place with her dad and his new family she decides to stop going to visit and it's just her and her mom for the holidays and it's been like that until the last few years.
Casey's mom deciding she's old enough to be by herself (since she's like 23) goes on a vacation to Hawaii where she meets, falls in love with and decides to make a relationship work with a man from Sweden they have a whirlwind romance (mostly not talked about in the book) and get married a few months after meeting where the mom is now going to be moving to Sweden to live with her new husband. Casey feeling all of this is too soon for their relationship and knowing her mom's track record with relationships ending badly (that go the same way as her own bad relationships) goes to the wedding to try to talk sense into her mom... only Erik is there to stop her from breaking off the wedding this is her mom's new step son... he is a smoking hot Swedish guy (naturally) and now her "step brother" kind of (?) I mean they just met so it's not like they are actually related.
Casey is not able to stop the wedding from happening and her mom marries and then moves to Sweden as planned feeling that she missed her opportunity to stop this from happening in the first place when she is invited to celebrate Christmas with her mom in Sweden she views this as a second chance to talk sense into her mom get her to move back with her to LA and they can forget this whole situation happened... only once she gets there Erik has already arrived and he lives a few hours away so of course he's staying in the house in the room right next to hers in fact... this is a nightmare how is she ever going to get her mom alone to get her out of this situation when she has no actual time with her?
So maybe it's because I'm older (in my 40's) but I felt that the whole beginning of the book was Casey being selfish she shouldn't be jet setting all over the place to try to break up her mom's relationship with this new man when it's for once not a toxic relationship like the ones in the past she also brought up her feelings about being left by her dad and his new family and now her mom is starting a new family too she is trying to include you she invited you to Christmas... let your mom be happy girl say congratulations and enjoy the holidays! I get that she had a past history with bad relationships and so did her mom but it's really not her place to keep throwing that in her mom's face especially during the holidays.
There is the taboo/forbidden part of this story where Casey and Erik are drawn to each other and begin quickly developing feelings but Casey at that point doesn't want to tell her mom and ruin what she has going on with her new happy life, so at that point there is growth for Casey and I liked that eventually she did stop trying to actively talk to her mom about breaking up with her husband. Will Erik and Casey be able to be together outside of this holiday vacation? They do live on opposite sides of the world and their parents are married so that complicates matters even more.
I think the relationship could have felt a bit more natural if the book was longer (I know it's a novella so everything has to happen in a shorter time frame but the lead FMC and MMC just met then everything is happening quicker than her mom and her new husbands whirlwind romance which Casey felt was happening too quick and I really didn't see how they could be anything more than physically attracted to one another in the few days they spent with each other with the story that was shown on the pages then the ending felt really rushed.
*ARC read *Novella *Book Sirens *Holiday romance *Forbidden romance
*enemies --> More *Strangers --> more *Stepbrother (new not since childhood)
*leads in their early -mid 20's *spice *instalust/love
Extra Thoughts:
This book wasn't bad but it just wasn't for me, but I'm sure that plenty of people will enjoy this if they like a instalust/love forbidden holiday romance novella
Some weird conversations where Erik was trying not to be "pushy" but kept asking why after Casey had given some reasons just made me feel uncomfortable and I wasn't even there... he was a nice enough guy but if she already told you how she felt about it and you continue to press the matter you are just making things awkward for everyone.
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