Book: A Fool’s Gold Christmas by Susan Mallery

Reviewer: Danielle

Genre: Adult Romance

Preferred Reading Setting: Curled up by a fire or snuggled in a warm bed

Reading Accoutrements: This book takes place during Christmas time, so there are lots of holiday goodies and festive drinks. A nice peppermint martini and some brownies would be the most comforting, but don’t read too much or you’ll have a hangover for the highlight event.  

I started reading Susan Mallery’s Fool’s Gold series about the unique, women-centric town of Fool’s Gold (and the couples pairing off there) because my sister wanted a second chance at getting me into romance novels. The first romance novel she had me read gave me plenty of ammo against her every time I saw her reading.

Bethany: It was one stupid line out of a whole book! ONE LINE!

Danielle: ‘Make me feel alive!’

Bethany: Shut up and go back to your review.

Susan Mallery’s Fool’s Gold series follows the young women in a town with an unbalanced ratio of men to women (in other words, there are not enough men to go around). I first read Summer Nights, which is Charlie’s story, and from there I was hooked. I had to know about the other characters and their relationships. I soon learned the Susan Mallery romance novel equation: girl meets boy, boy makes mistake, girls of the town unite to comfort her and drink heavily, boy realizes mistake and comes back. It seems simple, yet each story is enticing enough to keep you reading the series.

A Fool’s Gold Christmas follows Evie Stryker, the long lost sister of the Stryker brothers (they have books of their own – Summer Nights is one of them) who moves to the town after an accident forces her to accept help from her long estranged mother. Evie and her family have to learn to forgive and accept one another by learning to understand each other’s motivations. That becomes one of the main themes of this book, forgiveness. This novel delves deep into feelings of resentment, guilt and loneliness… with a little bit of love, longing and sexual tension built in.

If you’re like me and don’t want to actually be seen reading a romance novel, but also have the guilty pleasure of loving to read them, this is the perfect book. It’s a fast, easy read with a whirlwind love story. On the scale of steaminess, however, the book could be rivaled by a bowl of soup. Many of the books in the series give you feelings of lust toward the characters, but this is dramatically subdued here.

If you’re estranged from family members or are working through familial differences this holiday season, this book will give you all the feels. If you are in a good place with your family, this book will remind you to cherish the peace you have. Family bonds, male stupidity, and forgiveness are bold themes to enjoy in this spirited holiday romance – just don’t forget the peppermint martini!