Read in 2021 - 18: Sleigh Bells in the Snow

Years ago, my sister and I were in Ripon for our annual Yorkshire Holiday. It must have been July or August, high summer anyway. As usual, my mother-in-law had put aside a pile of paperbacks for me to choose from and take home with me. I was into seasonal reading at the time, and chose two or three Christmas-themed books. This was one of them.

Sarah Morgan's "Sleigh Bells in the Snow" was published in 2013, pre-Covid times that now seem so different and far away from the present.

The story offers no surprises: Girl meets boy, falls in love almost instantly but has to overcome obstacles that seem insurmountable; in the end, it all pans out very nicely and exactly as expected.

In this case, Kayla hates Christmas - not because she is a modern incarnation of Ebenezer Scrooge, but because when she was 13 years old, she had a traumatising experience at Christmas. Ever since, she has worked hard to become independent from all family (and other) ties, and has made a successful career for herself.

Something that starts out as a work assignment, ideal for Kayla to escape all the Christmas fuss in the big city, quickly turns into a nightmare when she discovers that her new client's place and his family are heavily into all things Christmas. But it takes the super-gorgeous client, his grumpy granddad, warm-hearted mother, adorable puppy and a cast of other characters not long to change Kayla's outlook and attitude... for good.

I must say that I was not overly impressed with the writing style, but that's clearly not what the author was aiming for anyway. The whole thing is designed to provide a little escapism and easy entertainment, and it delivers on both accounts.

Not something I would spend any money on, but not a total waste of time, either - mainly because I read nearly all of it while cat-sitting, with sweet Hobbes on my lap and nothing else to do. It was my second (and probably my last) book by Sarah Morgan; you can find the review for the first one here.