A review by stormshultz
Sweetshop of Dreams by Jenny Colgan

3.0

I want to open this by saying normally I really enjoy Jenny's books, but this one... well, this one fell a little flat. I listened to it on audio, so I'm not sure how this translates to pages but this story was at least 4hrs too long. It's a 12hr audiobook and 8hrs in and I was like ??? why is there still so much left?? Nothing big had happened. I love the idea of leaving the big city to take over a sweetshop in a village. That's one of my favorite tropes, but this one just dragged on. There were four love interests at one point (??) and most of the characters were pretty flat, given that this is a 12hr long book. I liked Lillian, the quirky candy recipes at the beginning of each chapter, and I enjoyed Rosie too, although I wish she would have gotten her stuff together quicker. There was a decent amount of swearing too (which isn't abnormal for Jenny's books, but just a warning if you're planning on listening to it with kids around). And I didn't really care for how one of the love interests, which seemed to make the most sense for Rosie, suddenly ended up being gay but there was no hint of that? Instead, she realizes he's gay because of the pants he decides to wear to the town fair, which admittedly made no sense to me and it felt a little weird to write off one of the love interests that quickly. *Sigh.* Oh well, everyone has a book fall flat though! I do recommend the Beach Street Bakery series by Jenny if you're looking for a cozy baking themed read in a small town!