Review: A Bella Flora Christmas by Wendy Wax

A Bella Flora Christmas

by Wendy Wax

Pages: 87

Format: eARC

Buy the Book: Amazon

Goodreads:  Although their lives have changed since their first desperate renovation of Bella Flora, friends Madeline, Avery, and Nicole have always been there for each other. Now they're returning to Bella Flora for Christmas—where Maddie’s daughter Kyra isn’t feeling particularly celebratory. 
 
Kyra was hoping for a peaceful holiday at Bella Flora—a last gathering before a wealthy, mystery tenant moves into the home she’s been forced to rent out. Instead, she must make a life altering decision by New Year’s -- a decision that becomes even more difficult when unexpected guests arrive at Ten Beach Road on Christmas Eve. Now Kyra, Maddie, Avery and Nikki will need to pull together to secure Bella Flora’s future, as well as their own.

Kritters Thoughts:  A Bella Flora Christmas is a novella in the Ten Beach Road series and although I haven't read all of this series, I am invested and love the characters.  I was excited to see that there was a Christmas novella because I like seeing characters in a series get thrown into a holiday novella.  But this one didn't work for me.

First, the book started with almost a full recap of the whole series.  The first two chapters were a rehash and as novellas are extremely short, I didn't want a recap, I would have preferred her jump right into the story.  I also don't feel like people usually read novellas unless they are already full invested into the series, and especially since this is book 5.5 in the series.  Like me, readers must have read at least one or two books in the series to get to this point.  

On the complete opposite hand, I did love reading about these characters during the holidays.  Once you get past the recap of the first two chapters, the story begins and it is a great little addition to the series.  I wouldn't have minded if this book had not been a novella but a full book in the series and see these characters go through the holiday season and start a new year.  

If you have already read books in this series than maybe skip the first two chapters and enjoy this one, but if you haven't I would completely suggest going back to the beginning or close to the beginning and reading a book or two before diving into this one.  


Rating: enjoyable, but didn't leave me wanting more
                (ready for a full novel, not a novella in this series)

Ebook 2018 Challenge: 12 out of 100

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I received one copy of this book free of charge from Netgalley.  I was not required to write a positive review in exchange for receipt of the book; rather, the opinions expressed in this review are my own.