Review: The Christmas Book Hunt by Jenny Colgan

Name: The Christmas Book Hunt
Series: Stand-Alone
Author: Jenny Colgan
Publisher: Amazon Original Stories
Format: Kindle (through Amazon First Reads)
Genres: Christmas, Contemporary, Romance
Steam or Spice: None

Rating:

Synopsis: Goodreads
A Christmas mission…

Mirren’s beloved great-aunt Violet is seriously ill. Her one Christmas wish is to be reunited with a long-lost hand-illustrated book from her childhood, a challenge Mirren gladly accepts to give Violet some much-needed festive cheer.

An enchanting journey…

With no sign of the cherished volume online, Mirren falls into the fascinating world of rare books. From London to snowy Hay-on-Wye and Edinburgh’s cobbled streets, she chases leads from bookshop to bookshop—and bumps into mysterious, charming Theo, who, unbeknownst to her, is searching for the same book for reasons of his own…

The start of a new chapter?

As the two join forces to track the book down before time runs out for Violet, will Mirren find her Christmas miracle—and maybe even a kiss under the mistletoe… ?

Review:

Ahh, this was a lovely little holiday short story. It begins with Mirren, our FMC, finding out about her Great Aunt’s diagnosis and agreeing to go hunt for her Great Aunt’s favourite childhood book before time runs out for her. On her journey across the country hunting for this book, Mirren meets Theo – the nephew of a book collector… Of course, they haven’t exactly met by chance, no matter what Mirren thinks as it turns out Theo’s is hunting for the same book she is!

I didn’t connect with Mirren (nor any of the characters) but that felt like it wasn’t a big deal in such a short book. Mirren was nice enough- after all she was willingly hunting for this book for her Great Aunt despite not really knowing where to look for it. I did enjoy her character though! I am not sure I’d call it growth necessarily, but the Mirren at the start of the short story and the Mirren at the end felt like there was a change in them! I really liked that.

I loved Theo from the moment he and Mirren started enganging in and old English style conversation in order for things to be somewhat less awkward between them when they met. I thought Theo was sweet and got the short end of the stick in this short story! But for as much as romance is listed as one of the genres… I really think, the focus is actually on the love Mirren has for her Great Aunt, Violet. After all, she’s willing to travel the country hunting for this book to cheer her up.

We know I’m not the biggest fan of short stories as I feel like it’s hard to really connect to a story that’s over in 100 pages, but I think Jenny Colgan did a good job with The Christmas Book Hunt as I did enjoy it! I did feel as though the ending was rushed, but not necessarily too rushed or even in a bad way. It kind of matched the pacing of what was on the page, I think.

Overall this was a lovely little Christmas read!

“Books change the world,’ said the old man…”

Reading With Tyler