The Pumpkin Spice Café

After hearing all the hype about this book and being unable to resist its cute, autumnal cover, I finally decided to pick up "The Pumpkin Spice Cafe." Jeanie is hoping for a fresh start in the cozy little town of Dream Harbour as she takes over her aunt's beloved café. Before the big reopening, she meets Logan, a local farmer who instantly captures her attention, and she falls head over heels for him. Logan feels an attraction to Jeanie too, but he's just not ready for a new beginning after his last relationship failed miserably. Is there a chance for their love? I started the book with really high expectations. It's been hyped since last year, and I'm a sucker for cozy small-town romance, especially with an autumn vibe. I was really looking forward to it. Unfortunately, I was let down pretty quickly. The writing style felt flat and distant. I couldn't connect with the characters at all, and honestly, it felt like there was a lot of tell and not enough show. I was promised a grumpy x sunshine trope, but the characters often seemed defined by those labels rather than actually embodying them. While Logan is a little bit grumpy, Jeanie doesn't come across as sunshine at all. I just expected something different. The book is rather short, so I knew I couldn't expect a slow-burn romance, but everything moved way too fast for my liking. I couldn’t feel the chemistry between them because it all happened too quickly, and like I said, I felt a significant distance from the characters. As for Dream Harbour's atmosphere, yes, it had that small-town charm, but honestly, it felt way too cheesy and overdone. At times, it read like a parody of such stories, because it was just too exaggerated. The author relies heavily on clichés (like a woman from a big city looking for a fresh start in the countryside, the farmer only wearing flannel shirts and haven a full beard, and everyone in the city being super nice and helpful, etc.). While I’m usually okay with this in other books, the execution here felt quite shallow. As for the plot, I can't say much because not much really happens. They fall in love extremely fast, a few odd things occur in the café, and that's about it. I missed the passion between the characters, the cute cozy autumn vibes, even a bit of heartache, and little more depth. I really wanted to love this book, but it ended up being a huge disappointment for me. ...weiterlesen

After finding her boss dying of stress, Jeanie wants to start over. Her aunts offer to take over the little Pumpkin Spice Café in the small town of Dream Harbour is exactly what she needs. Within the first week she notices three thing: firstly everybody seems to be very nice, secondly weird thing are happening around the café and thirdly, the person who is helping her most is the handsome but quite farmer Logan on whom she had a crush right from the beginning. Will these two find their way towards one another while solving what's happening to the Pumpkin Spice Café? ...weiterlesen