*I received a free copy of The Heart of Christmas from Harlequin HQN via Netgalley. This has in no way influenced my voluntary review, which is honest and unbiased *
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Just call her Christmas Eve…
Eve Harmon has always enjoyed Christmas, but this year it reminds her of everything she doesn't have. Almost all her friends are married now, and that's what Eve wants, too. Love. A husband and kids of her own. But the B and B she manages, and even Whiskey Creek, the small Gold Country town where she was born and raised, suddenly seem…confining.
Eve's worried that her future will simply be a reflection of her past. There's no one in the area she could even imagine as a husband—until a handsome stranger comes to town. Eve's definitely attracted to him, and he seems to have the same reaction to her. But his darkly mysterious past could ruin Eve's happily ever after—just when it finally seems within reach. And just when she's counting on the best Christmas of her life!
The Heart of Christmas is a lovely story about Eve, who is one of my few friends in Whiskey Creek still in need of some serious TLC!
My The Heart of Christmas review:
Eve Harmon is the character who is the main focus in The Heart of Christmas. For a long time, she’s been all alone, and her last relationship didn’t last, and now, Ted is engaged to someone else – with Eve’s blessings. For her birthday, she decides to go all out, even if her friends or parents aren’t in town, and when she wakes up the next day, there’s a strange man sleeping next to her in bed. Completely out of character for her, Eve is trying to piece together the evening when the mystery man wakes up and grabs her – until he realizes that he’s with a naked woman – in a bed.
As The Heart of Christmas continues, Eve doesn’t know much more about the sexy stranger, but as she pieces together her wild night, she realizes they had sex without using a condom. This really made me roll my eyes a little… I hate when unsafe sex is used like a plot-device and this is the reason why I gave four stars to this story instead of five. The overall story and the plot still appealed to me, though, especially because there was a lot more going on that usual in Whiskey Creek. Danger was looming, and that made the romance even more sweet in my opinion.
Reading a novel in the Whiskey Creek series never fails to make me feel like I’m catching up with friends I haven’t had a chance to see for a while, and The Heart of Christmas did that as well. Seeing Eve and her longing for a stable family life with a husband and children was great, because I think she is not alone in feeling that way. After seeing so many of her friends settling down, having a family of her own became even more important to her.
Written in third person point of view the flow of the story and the mystery was very even, and it took a while for me to understand all the secrecy behind the mysterious man, and why he felt like he needed to keep his distance, even when he didn’t want to.
If you want to pre-order The Heart of Christmas – which is released tomorrow, you get $1 off ! 
Some of my favorite The Heart of Christmas quotes:
Eve couldn’t imagine she’d be happy leaving Whiskey Creek. Besides her parents, she had so many good friends here – and she’d be the godmother to Chey’s baby, which would bring a great deal of joy into her life. But would that be enough? Suddenly, it felt as if she was living off the crumbs of other people’s lives and trying to tell herself that she would be content with that indefinitely.
He didn’t think they’d continue to see each other, did he? If he was moving on, she’d rather not get any more involved with him. Even if he wasn’t, there were too many inconsistencies in what he said and did, not to mention downright evasions.
About Linda @ (un)Conventional Bookworms
Linda is an English as foreign language teacher and has a Master's degree in English Language and Literature. She's an avid reader, blogger, compulsive one-clicker and a genre omnivore. Ever since she learnt how to read she has been seen with a book or two in her hands everywhere she goes.
I’ve heard such good things about Brenda Novak in general. It seems everyone just seems to love her books, lol. This one sounds lovely. Maybe I’ll save it for Christmas time. =)
I have enjoyed almost all of Novak’s book, Jules. I really enjoy her writing, and her characters always get to me, too.
This one is a very nice Christmas story, for sure 🙂
Thanks for stopping by!
A four star review for the seventh installment in a series is very telling. Yay for Eve finally getting her own slice of HEA, it sounds like it was very well deserved. You can’t go wrong with characters that feel like old friends. 🙂
The Whiskey Creek crew is amazing! I’m sad there won’t be more books in this series, but hopefully, I’ll fall in love with other stories by Novak in the future 🙂
And it’s true that this series is a strong contemporary romance series, the character development is really good, and the stories always involve characters that were prominent in prior books.
Thanks for stopping by, Carmel.
Oh I love when you stick it out with a series after a while and still find the series interesting and love it. It sounds like this series is it for you! Lovely review Lexxie! I doubt I could stick it out seven books lol
I’m the opposite of you, then, Lily, because I love staying with the same characters, in the same universe over the course of several books. When I enjoy a series, I do become a little bit obsessed, and this series is really like coming home hanging out with my good friends!
Thanks for stopping by 🙂
Learning the secrets behind mystery man and getting in the holiday mood sounds great
I love reading holiday themed stories, so this sounds like it’ll be perfect for Christmas! One of my favorite parts of reading a series is the feeling like you’re visiting with old friends again. I love that. I have a slightly difficult time believing they’d forget to use a condom, too, and I totally get why you rated it down a star for that plot device, lol. Get it? Device? 😉 Great review, Lexxie! After Halloween, I’m really going to be looking forward to Halloween. 🙂
I’ll have to come back to read your review, Lexxie, since I’m about to start this one. But I’m glad to see a 4-star review since that means that Ms. Novak must have made you pretty happy with this latest installment. 🙂
I hope you’re having a lovely week – settling back into routine. I’ve come down with a cold. Yuck! And my mother-in-law is here visiting. The girls (and the marching band) put on their best performance this year for the State competition yesterday. They placed 6th out of 10. Enjoy the rest of your day!! **BIG HUGS**
Well, I see we took issue with the same thing. 😉 But overall, I really liked The Heart of Christmas. There’s just something about a Whiskey Creek novel that makes me warm and fuzzy. *ha* And it’s all thanks to you that I began reading this series, Lexxie!! <3
Twitter: BerlsS
I agree – I totally rolled my eyes with the no protection comment. But, I can overlook it if the story was still good and the character’s solid. I think I need to look into this series – I love series that feel like good friends! Great review 🙂