Mariah Carey may be waiting for 12:01AM November 1st to make her big Christmas entrance every year, but for me November signals one thing only–time to switch over to holiday romance books and fire up the Hallmark movies! And this year’s inaugural holiday romance was this sweet second chance/enemies to lovers/forced proximity truffle from Falon Ballard called ALL I WANT IS YOU (again, cue the Mariah Carey). This was my first Falon Ballard book, and I really enjoyed her voice in the rom-com space–it’s light, funny, great banter, a lot of spice, and ultimately very sweet. This is almost like cotton candy–it’s very sweet and light, but there isn’t a ton of substance to it. Still, it’s fun to have around.
The premise is that Jessica and Nick are both romance writers–he’s very successful and mainstream but his signature move is that he doesn’t deliver an HEA and she’s much more niche and hasn’t quite caught on in the mainstream but has a small and loyal following…and she always delivers the HEA. They dated five years ago and both launched their careers at that time. But just after their third Christmas together, he dumped her out of the blue just when she thought things were getting serious for reasons unknown. Five years later, their publisher has asked Jessica to give an introduction speech for Nick as he wins a romance writer award just before Christmas at a tiny little hotel in New England. It snows, and the two enemies are stuck together after the awards party as they wait for things to clear up. But the forced proximity allows them to find that old spark, which in turn helps their writing, and it may finally be time to discuss their shared history.
I feel like the premise here is really fun and has the potential to be romantic and full of holiday. But the story itself needed a little elf pass to make it feel more like a Christmas story. Outside of knowing this takes place at Christmas, the book would have benefitted from more holiday details, or maybe some holiday events for everyone that was snowed in together. I felt like the lack of holiday was hampered by the fact that you get to flashback to Nick and Jessica’s first and second Christmas together, and rather than feeling really sweet and Christmas-y, this is where you’re getting the bedroom scenes–kind of awkward, sort of unnecessary, and not the holliest and jolliest. It also feels like writers writing about writers needs some kind of facelift as it’s become such a common romance trope.
The hardest aspect, though, of ALL I WANT IS YOU is this secret about why Nick and Jessica broke up in the first place, which isn’t just a secret to the audience, it’s also a secret to Jessica. It’s difficult to know if we should be rooting for them to get back together without knowing why things went so south, and it also puts a tremendous burden on that reason to be something forgivable by the time you learn what it is in the last 20% of the book. This part didn’t really work for me, because I didn’t totally buy Nick’s reasons for keeping it a secret. Feels like a little talking would have just saved everyone a lot of time. It’s never a good feeling to feel like communication is really the issue at the center of conflict.
Still, the book is super sweet and I think would be fun reading over a holiday break by the fireplace. I’m hoping there will be some other wonderful holiday romances in the weeks to come–it’s what the people deserve this season!
3.5 out of 5 stars
Synopsis (from Amazon):
Exes. Professional rivals. Just one bed. What could go wrong?
All Jessica has ever wanted is her own happily ever after. But until that happens, she spends her days as a small-time romance writer, penning satisfying Happily Ever Afters to soothe the heartache left by her ex-boyfriend Nick—also a romance writer and now her biggest rival—who has found success writing love stories without happy endings. It’s what he’s good at, after all . . .
So when their professional obligations bring them to a remote inn a few days before Christmas, they’re a little more than peeved, especially when they get trapped sharing a room in a snowstorm. But what’s more fitting for two romantic writers in a slump? Realizing the friction between them might be the only cure for their writer’s block, they decide to turn their frustration into fiction . . . and the pages start flying. But will Jess’s heart soar, too? Nick is the last guy on earth she should love . . . but what if he is really all she wants for Christmas?
