Then Emory and her 17-year-old brother, Joey, are in a car accident in which a girl dies. Everyone in the town of Mill Haven knows her as the rich girl her workaholic parents see her as their good child. There’s not much plot here, but readers will relish the opportunity to climb inside Autumn’s head.Ī gut-wrenching look at how addiction affects a family and a town.Įmory Ward, 16, has long been invisible. Even secondary characters are well-rounded, with their own histories and motivations. Autumn’s coming-of-age is sensitively chronicled, with a wide range of experiences and events shaping her character. But on August 8, everything changes, and Autumn has to rely on all her strength to move on. In the summer after graduation, Autumn and Finny reconnect and are finally ready to be more than friends.
Growing up, Autumn and Finny were like peas in a pod despite their differences: Autumn is “quirky and odd,” while Finny is “sweet and shy and everyone like him.” But in eighth grade, Autumn and Finny stop being friends due to an unexpected kiss. They drift apart and find new friends, but their friendship keeps asserting itself at parties, shared holiday gatherings and random encounters. The finely drawn characters capture readers’ attention in this debut.Īutumn and Phineas, nicknamed Finny, were born a week apart their mothers are still best friends. Finley is presumed White, and British Arthur is biracial (Indian/White).Ī quaint romance that succeeds after an opening stumble. The end result is a pleasant romance set against a solid character piece. Fortunately, he and the rest get rounded out by the ending, which boasts enough shading to set the novel apart from the Christmas movie allusions that come up at every other turn.
The opening chapters are the novel’s weakest: Finley’s self-absorption renders the secondary characters as cartoonish and painted in broad strokes, particularly Arthur. Finley juggles expectations against reality, trying to make the best of a bunch of crummy situations, and the round robin of plotlines is slowly fleshed out. With a little elbow grease and a Christmas miracle, Finley might just be able to salvage things and give everyone the greatest gift of all: love. The biggest surprise is that her haughty/hotty classmate, Arthur, has followed her home with his Christmas-obsessed aunt in tow, lured under false pretenses to celebrate in a town that’s supposed to be dripping with holiday cheer. Her hometown BFF is dating her ex–BF, her mom has skipped town for some me time, and her bitter rival is working at her grandmother’s inn. After flaming out at her fancy Connecticut boarding school, Finley Brown returns to her hometown of Christmas, Oklahoma, and is shocked to see things aren’t the way she left them.
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