Book Reviews

Book Blurb

Down on his luck is Gideon Joy’s default state. He doesn’t know why he expected a different outcome on his cross-country trip, but unsurprisingly, the hits keep coming—literally this time. Gideon strikes a moose with his car in New Hampshire, not only totaling his own vehicle, but damaging one belonging to local construction worker, Silas Bright. He has no choice but to stay in Lancaster and take on a job that’ll pay for the repairs. And in a town so small, Gideon’s constantly running into Silas. What starts as annoyance between them soon blooms into something much more intimate. But when Gideon’s notorious bad luck rears its head yet again, how many disastrous dates will Silas be willing to weather before realizing Gideon’s not worth the effort?

The quaint community has accepted Gideon as one of their own, but past fears of inadequacy threaten the very joy he left Los Angeles to discover. If he’s to find a happily ever after with Silas, Gideon must learn to accept that sometimes it’s okay to not be the best. And true happiness might be an everyday life in a small town.

 

 

First edition published by Dreamspinner Press, April 2017. This edition has been entirely revised and freshly edited.

 

Book Review

The changeover from his hectic life in LA, California, to a (more or less) quiet existence in a small town in New Hampshire is not an easy one to make for Gideon. He wasn’t even consciously looking for a permanent change, being on an “unplanned excursion” across the country. It’s a rather daring experiment for a man who describes himself as follows: “Nothing ever worked out. Nowhere was ever home. No one wanted to love a guy with luck so bad, it was laughable.” But as it turns out, life isn’t entirely horrible in a place with “more animal crossings than traffic lights”.

“Bundle of joy” is not exactly the way to describe Gideon, and despite his last name - which, ironically, is “Joy” – that was not the emotion he caused me to have when I began reading his story. Depressed is more like it. Well, and a little amused because his “encounter” with the moose ends well for the moose, him, and the stranger whose car Gideon has damaged. The tone he tells the story in is so self-deprecating and he is so convinced everything will go wrong that I shook my head and crossed my fingers for him to have a happy ending anyway and against his expectations – but I did not hold my breath.

Silas is a construction worker, very laid-back, and more than a little mysterious. He is also friendly, despite the fact that Gideon damaged his car and can’t even pay for the repairs. As it turns out, he is very interested in Gideon, but bad luck interferes pretty soon, and both Gideon and I didn’t have much faith in Silas sticking with his apparently romantic interest in the town’s newest inhabitant.

If you like stories about men who expect bad luck only to find out there may be places where they can be happy, if you want to immerse yourself in life in a quiet little town with a friendly B&B, a decidedly homophobic bar, and a restaurant that hires complete strangers on the spot, and if you’re looking for an entertaining read that might just make you smile, then you will probably like this novella.

 

 

 

 

DISCLAIMER: Books reviewed on this site were usually provided at no cost by the publisher or author. This book has been provided by the publisher for the purpose of a review.

Additional Information

Format	ebook
Length	Novella, 92 pages
Heat Level
Publication Date	14-September-2020
Price	$2.99 ebook
Buy Link	https://www.amazon.com/Joy-Lancaster-Story-Book-2-ebook/dp/B08J2NBQ5N