Ally Gilmore is back in Pine Hollow to visit her grandparents for the holidays, when she discovers a Grinchy councilman is responsible for pulling the funding for her grandparents animal rescue. And they’ve got just a month to find new homes for 12 dogs of all shapes and sizes. Ben, the aforementioned Grinch, is juggling his own responsibilities, single-parenting his niece. He actually feels guilty about having to pull the rescue’s funds and agrees to help Ally place the dogs.
I loved the premise! I loved the town! I loved the dogs! I was even already predicting who book 2 in this series would be about, but there are two things about the Twelve Dogs of Christmas that drove me absolutely bonkers.
Twelve Dogs of Christmas has a major case of “kissus interruptus,” so bad that by 80 percent it wasn’t just delayed gratification, I was questioning whether these two wanted to get together at all.
Second, Ben is single-parenting his niece after the death of his sister and brother-in-law, and he uses Astrid as the main excuse for why he can’t date Ally. Ok, fine, You don’t want to introduce someone into your life who may not be around for long and create unrealistic expectations. Totally makes sense. But it’s more than that with Ben. He uses Astrid as a shield for the entire book. And there’s not nearly enough runway for his a-ha moment to be believable. By the time it happened, I was already wanting to tell Ally to quit trying to make her case and move on.
3 stars
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For more 2020 Christmas romance reads, check out 3 New Totally Not Twee Christmas Romances.