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A review by hania_haru
Pumpkin Spice by Tagan Shepard
4.0
Lots of thanks to NetGalley and Bold Strokes Books for providing me this book in exchange for an honest review (I thought I would never say this thank you so much)!
Lots of pumpkin spice lattes, wood chopping, pumpkins and autumn coziness… I love it!
I give “Pumpkin Spice” 4 out of 5 stars! I can't believe that Tagan Shepard is so underrated because I devoured this book!
Once I got into it properly I finished it in my second sitting and it was such a light and fun romance read. It was my first LBGTQ related book and it didn’t disappoint at all.
To give you a brief introduction:
Pumpkin Spice is about Nicki who is the biggest homebody and even almost a hermit. Because of a disastrous breakup she stopped believing in a happily ever after and avoids any unnecessary contact with the outside world. For Carter, the love interest and who works at her family’s pumpkin farm goes the same. Nicki’s Halloween obsessed niece, Lily, makes her go pick pumpkins at the same farm and when Nicki pumps into Carter it’s love at first sight. That’s not all, Lily also asks her hero aunt to help out with the Halloween Festival which will be held out at Carter’s Farm and that’s where the romance starts to bloom between the two… Maybe a happily ever after is possible after all?
Specific Rating
The cover: ⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2
Plot: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Characters development: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Romance: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Average: 3,9
Tropes
- Small town romance
- Halloween and autumn ofcourse!
- Introverted x Extraverted
- Love at first sight
The book is set in Bucks Mill, Virginia. As I said in the tropes section that it’s a small town romance which was my first time reading it. It was simple and realistic which I found really nice and the book started off powerfully giving a good introduction to the protagonist. I really liked how the author connected one event to another to make sure Nicki can see Carter again in a natural way. It wasn’t too obvious and over the top. Ofcourse they met pretty often in the month the book progressed in but from a small town romance it’s expected and it wasn’t weird. The interactions were nice, subtle and not too long. It was at a length that there was enough room for another interaction next time it happened. The first thing I saw was how good the writing style was which was really easy to adjust to and I can really appreciate that.
It wasn’t repetitive nor amateur at all so that’s a big plus point to the author!
Plot and World building
I don’t have much to say about this in a good sense because it was a predictable plot for a short book, it delivered a good story and stayed true to its synopsis!
There was a good balance between dialogue and description.
Characters
I adored the relationship Nicki had with her niece Lily. She was really seen as the hero aunt by Lily who she could tell everything to and did fun things with. I really liked their interactions.
The same goes for Nicki with her sister, Rachel. They often had wine nights where Nicki would spill all the tea about her interactions with Carter and it made me really warm from the inside to see such a good bond between the sisters. I do wanna say that I wish that there were maybe 2 more characters who Nicki could interact with because it seemed like her social circle was really really small. Ofcourse it was a short book but she interacted with only a handful people which I found too little. Besides that I also wanna say that I didn’t expect Nicki and Carter to be almost 40? They didn’t behave like that, in the sense of that they were behaving more like begin / mid 30s and I thought 40 was a little too much… The same goes for the moms of Lily’s friends, they weren’t acting that age at all, there is one like a typical popular / arrogant type mom and she seemed more like mid 20 than near 40 so that was a bit confusing. I understand that the author wants to give the readers a realistic view of an adult working, introverted protagonist and that true love is still possible at a later age but I think if they were a little younger it would make more sense with their behaviour. Maybe I’m just too used to 20-30 year old protagonists haha!
Romance
What can I say, the romance was great! I loved the chemistry and dialogues between Nicki and Carter, they had their inside jokes and Carter really put Nicki’s awkwardness at ease.
They bonded really well and it wasn’t insta-lovey thankfully. I wouldn’t say that there’s smut because it wasn’t explicit at all but more that there were intimate moments so that’s really ideal for readers that prefer that over smut!
Conclusion
To wrap it up, I really recommend this book for anyone who wants a cozy Halloween autumn filled book with an absolutely adorable romance story! It was really enjoyable, there was a nice story flow and again I’m super happy I got an eARC to review this book, thank you so so much for that!
I hope this review gave you a proper idea about this book and convinces you to read it, enjoy! (:
Copy paste the link to see the whole review I made: https://carbonated-amethyst-e15.notion.site/Pumpkin-Spice-Review-1c704b5faebc45019be86ff35ab10bf0
Lots of pumpkin spice lattes, wood chopping, pumpkins and autumn coziness… I love it!
I give “Pumpkin Spice” 4 out of 5 stars! I can't believe that Tagan Shepard is so underrated because I devoured this book!
Once I got into it properly I finished it in my second sitting and it was such a light and fun romance read. It was my first LBGTQ related book and it didn’t disappoint at all.
To give you a brief introduction:
Pumpkin Spice is about Nicki who is the biggest homebody and even almost a hermit. Because of a disastrous breakup she stopped believing in a happily ever after and avoids any unnecessary contact with the outside world. For Carter, the love interest and who works at her family’s pumpkin farm goes the same. Nicki’s Halloween obsessed niece, Lily, makes her go pick pumpkins at the same farm and when Nicki pumps into Carter it’s love at first sight. That’s not all, Lily also asks her hero aunt to help out with the Halloween Festival which will be held out at Carter’s Farm and that’s where the romance starts to bloom between the two… Maybe a happily ever after is possible after all?
Specific Rating
The cover: ⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2
Plot: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Characters development: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Romance: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Average: 3,9
Tropes
- Small town romance
- Halloween and autumn ofcourse!
- Introverted x Extraverted
- Love at first sight
The book is set in Bucks Mill, Virginia. As I said in the tropes section that it’s a small town romance which was my first time reading it. It was simple and realistic which I found really nice and the book started off powerfully giving a good introduction to the protagonist. I really liked how the author connected one event to another to make sure Nicki can see Carter again in a natural way. It wasn’t too obvious and over the top. Ofcourse they met pretty often in the month the book progressed in but from a small town romance it’s expected and it wasn’t weird. The interactions were nice, subtle and not too long. It was at a length that there was enough room for another interaction next time it happened. The first thing I saw was how good the writing style was which was really easy to adjust to and I can really appreciate that.
It wasn’t repetitive nor amateur at all so that’s a big plus point to the author!
Plot and World building
I don’t have much to say about this in a good sense because it was a predictable plot for a short book, it delivered a good story and stayed true to its synopsis!
There was a good balance between dialogue and description.
Characters
I adored the relationship Nicki had with her niece Lily. She was really seen as the hero aunt by Lily who she could tell everything to and did fun things with. I really liked their interactions.
The same goes for Nicki with her sister, Rachel. They often had wine nights where Nicki would spill all the tea about her interactions with Carter and it made me really warm from the inside to see such a good bond between the sisters. I do wanna say that I wish that there were maybe 2 more characters who Nicki could interact with because it seemed like her social circle was really really small. Ofcourse it was a short book but she interacted with only a handful people which I found too little. Besides that I also wanna say that I didn’t expect Nicki and Carter to be almost 40? They didn’t behave like that, in the sense of that they were behaving more like begin / mid 30s and I thought 40 was a little too much… The same goes for the moms of Lily’s friends, they weren’t acting that age at all, there is one like a typical popular / arrogant type mom and she seemed more like mid 20 than near 40 so that was a bit confusing. I understand that the author wants to give the readers a realistic view of an adult working, introverted protagonist and that true love is still possible at a later age but I think if they were a little younger it would make more sense with their behaviour. Maybe I’m just too used to 20-30 year old protagonists haha!
Romance
What can I say, the romance was great! I loved the chemistry and dialogues between Nicki and Carter, they had their inside jokes and Carter really put Nicki’s awkwardness at ease.
They bonded really well and it wasn’t insta-lovey thankfully. I wouldn’t say that there’s smut because it wasn’t explicit at all but more that there were intimate moments so that’s really ideal for readers that prefer that over smut!
Conclusion
To wrap it up, I really recommend this book for anyone who wants a cozy Halloween autumn filled book with an absolutely adorable romance story! It was really enjoyable, there was a nice story flow and again I’m super happy I got an eARC to review this book, thank you so so much for that!
I hope this review gave you a proper idea about this book and convinces you to read it, enjoy! (:
Copy paste the link to see the whole review I made: https://carbonated-amethyst-e15.notion.site/Pumpkin-Spice-Review-1c704b5faebc45019be86ff35ab10bf0