Book Review: Chocolate Dreams at the Gingerbread Café, by Rebecca Raisin

Chocolate…the most irresistible temptation?

 

The Gingerbread Café is all a buzz! This Easter, Lily and the rest of the town of Ashford, Connecticut are planning a truly decadent Chocolate Festival. Cooking up a storm, CeeCee and Lily are not just baking a batch of their sinfully delicious chocolate-dipped gingerbread men, but an excess of chocolate truffles, squidgy, cinnamony hot cross buns and melt in your mouth chocolate eggs. The Gingerbread Café staff have definitely enjoyed the tasting process!

Add in Damon’s cute-as-a-button seven year old daughter, Charlie, up for a visit and Lily’s perfect Easter may just be around the corner. Until her ex-husband Joel turns up demanding twenty thousand dollars… Suddenly the future of the Gingerbread Café is not so clear…and Lily finds herself eating far more of The Gingerbread Café’s treats than her skinny jeans allow…

Can Lily concoct a brilliant plan to save her beloved café, convince Damon she has no feelings for Joel and still throw a Chocolate Festival the town will be talking about for years? There’s only one way to find out…

Welcome back to the warmth, cupcakes and hot chocolate of The Gingerbread Café – your home away from home.

***

This is the second irresistible book from The Gingerbread Café series. You can read my review for #1 here.

Lil and Damon are now living together, and they are just so darn-tootin’ adorable together, I absolutely love it. Damon’s young daughter Charlie is in Ashford too, and she is just an absolute sweetheart, and it was wonderful to see the relationship between the three as a family, and to see Charlie interact with all the familiar faces.

The characters are so well developed, the relationships are so warm and familiar-seeming and the whole setting is just wonderful. The tempting scents of chocolate, cinnamon and ginger seem to waft off the pages and fill your senses as you read (I highly recommend having some chocolate to hand when you read this, as I assure you, you will be craving it!)

I was so worried for Lil when her ex-husband Joe shows up demanding money. He is a seriously nasty piece of work who makes your skin crawl, and I was desperate to see him get his comeuppance and to leave Lil alone. At least she has Damon… Ahh, Damon… *swoon* 

You really can’t ask for more from a novella than what Rebecca supplies with each of these books. A colourful cast of character that feel like they’re your own friends and family, and an entertaining plot line which is warm, funny and touching. An absolute joy to read.

Another 5 star review for Rebecca Raisin, I cannot praise this series enough.

Rating: 

Release date: 20th March 2014
Publisher: Carina UK
Buy: Amazon UK
Buy: Amazon US
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