Book Review: Come To Stay by Natalie Anglin

Thanks to BookSirens for providing me with a e-copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

Title: Come To Stay

Author: Natalie Anglin

Description:

FIVE COZY ROMANTIC HOLIDAY STORIES. FEEL THE MAGIC OF CHRISTMAS.

1986: It’s Christmas Eve and Adrienne is desperate to find the perfect Christmas gift for her brother. Despite barely knowing her, Brandon offers to help.

2006: After Parker loses a bet to his friend, he has to wear an ugly Christmas sweater every day of December. He’s unimpressed but his new friend Greta thinks it’s hilarious.

2012: At university, Jared has a Christmas door decorating competition with his best friend and neighbour, Henry.

2016: Old childhood friends Lincoln and Ryleigh reunite after years apart. At a Christmas party, Lincoln’s siblings conspire to get them under the mistletoe.

2018: Kennedy agrees to pretend to be Jared’s girlfriend for the Christmas season to get his family off his back, but when she gets to his house, she has her eyes on someone else…

It’s almost Christmas which means it’s the time for reading some Christmas books. I have to admit I’m not a big fan of them usually and I’m always a bit skeptical when searching for them, but I still wanted to be in the Xmas spirit fully so I decided to pick this up. This is a collection of short stories, spread over the course of years, all following Christmas love stories in one family.

We start out with the story about how the parents met and continue on with their children finding their s/o many years later.

I found the stories to be alright but honestly it wasn’t nothing special or memorable. I think the problem with short romance stories is that you can’t really build up the chemistry and a good relationship in such a limited number of pages so they always feel kinda flat to me.

That being said I did really enjoy both of the stories featuring LGBT characters and I’m so glad the author brought in at least a little bit of diversity in this. Those two were my favorites, especially one between Jared and Henry.

Now I found the parents of the children, especially the mother Adrienne, to be so annoying. I couldn’t stand her. Now imagine if you went to your boyfriend’s (or gfs) house for the first time and the parents wouldn’t get off your back. They were so nosy and annoying and I get the feeling that the author wanted to make them fun and quirky but they were just unnecessary.

All in all this was a cute Christmas romance collection and it’s a quick read but definitely not something unique and memorable.