Portobello Book Blog

I read this after seeing so many reviews from fellow bloggers saying how much they had fallen in love with the story and its characters. I saved it to be my last Christmas read this year and, oh my goodness, what a great decision that was!

Viola is a musician in the orchestra for a London Opera company and plays, you’ve guessed it, the viola! It was really interesting to get a glimpse into her life as a professional musician with all the practice, passion and dedication that involved. When travelling by tube one day, she has a rather unpleasant encounter with a fellow commuter and just afterwards she meets Nate, who comes to check she is alright and who she is immediately attracted to. Nate is a lawyer and, as she soon finds out, a governor at a local primary school where she has been tasked with organising the nativity as community outreach work.

I really enjoyed the parts about the Nativity, many of which brought back memories of helping when my own children were little. I found lot of the nativity scenes quite amusing and others rather poignant. From the boy adamant that he wanted to be an armadillo, to the pushy parents wanting the best role for their child, to the quiet child getting her chance to shine, there was much that anyone involved in a nativity either as an organiser or a proud parent will recognise. And I absolutely fell in love with little Grace, Nate’s daughter.

Grace’s life has been rather well planned by her mother with little room for spontaneity and as Viola got to know her, her heart went out to the little girl. For reasons that will become clear if you read the book, Viola became very involved in Nate and Grace’s life and it was so lovely to see Grace begin to blossom and have the chance just to be a little girl, not a perfect child.

So there’s all of that and I haven’t even mentioned what goes on between Viola and Nate. These are two characters you will adore I’m sure, as they move towards a happy ending but with one very big problem which threatens to derail their developing relationship. The story shows that what is important at Christmas isn’t being apparently perfect but spending time with the people you love, having fun together doing the things you enjoy and making happy memories to look back on and treasure. It is a gorgeously romantic story and there’s snow, lots of snow. A truly magical Christmas tale to warm the heart.

My thanks to the publisher, One More Chapter, for my review copy from Netgalley. Notting Hill in the Snow is available now in all formats. At the time of writing, the Kindle version is only 99p so why not give yourself a Christmas treat? Order your copy here: Notting Hill in the Snow

From the back of the book

A Notting Hill nativity… what could go wrong?

Viola Smith plays the viola in an orchestra (yes really!) but this year she’s been asked to stretch her musical talents to organising Notting Hill’s local nativity.

Nate Williams isn’t looking forward to Christmas but as his small daughter, Grace, has the starring role in the show, he’s forced to stop being a Grinch and volunteer with Viola.

With the sparks between them hotter than the chestnuts roasting in Portobello market, Nate and Viola can’t deny their feelings. And as the snow starts to fall over London, they find themselves trapped together in more ways than one…

About the author

ules Wake’s earliest known declaration that she planned to be a writer came at the age of ten. Along the way she was diverted by the glamorous world of PR and worked on many luxury brands, taking journalists on press trips to awful places like Turin, Milan, Geneva, Paris, Brussels and Amsterdam and occasionally losing the odd member of the press in an airport. It gave her the opportunity to eat amazing food, drink free alcohol as well as providing opportunities to hone her writing skills on press releases and to research European cities for her books.

Eventually the voices in her head persuaded her it was time to sit down and write the novel she’d always talked about. Her debut novel, Talk to Me in 2014, was quickly followed by the bestselling From Italy With Love, published by HarperImpulse, which reached the top ten in the Amazon Kindle charts. Since then she has had eight further novels published.

Jules’ book Covent Garden in the Snow was a Kindle Top 2 bestseller and her latest book A Girl’s Best Friend will be published by Sphere in September. She also writes cosy romantic fiction as Julie Caplin and her next book in the Romantic Getaway’s series, The Northern Lights Lodge will be published by HarperImpulse in early 2019.

Follow on twitter @juleswake. Or visit her on http://www.juleswake.co.uk